AWS CloudFormation StackSets is a powerful feature that allows you to deploy CloudFormation stacks across multiple AWS accounts and regions. This is especially useful if you want to enforce consistent infrastructure across your organization, or if you’re managing multiple AWS accounts. In this tutorial, we’ll walk you through the process of creating a StackSet, and deploying it to multiple AWS accounts using the AWS CLI.

Step 1: Create a StackSet First, we need to create a StackSet. A StackSet is a CloudFormation stack that can deploy stacks to multiple accounts and regions. You can create a StackSet using the AWS Management Console, but we’ll use the AWS CLI for this tutorial.

To create a StackSet using the AWS CLI, run the following command:

aws cloudformation create-stack-set --stack-set-name MyStackSet --template-body file://stackset.yaml

In this command, replace MyStackSet with the name you want to give your StackSet, and stackset.yaml with the path to your CloudFormation template. This will create a new StackSet with the specified name, and use the CloudFormation template to define the resources to be created.

Step 2: Configure the StackSet Next, we need to configure the StackSet to deploy to multiple AWS accounts and regions. This is done using a StackSet instance. A StackSet instance is a CloudFormation stack that’s created in each AWS account and region you want to deploy to.

To create a StackSet instance using the AWS CLI, run the following command:

aws cloudformation create-stack-instances --stack-set-name MyStackSet --accounts 123456789012 234567890123 --regions us-east-1 us-west-2

In this command, replace MyStackSet with the name of your StackSet, 123456789012 and 234567890123 with the AWS account IDs you want to deploy to, and us-east-1 and us-west-2 with the regions you want to deploy to. This will create a new StackSet instance in each of the specified accounts and regions.

Step 3: Deploy the StackSet Now that we’ve created the StackSet and configured it to deploy to multiple accounts and regions, we can deploy it using the AWS CLI.

To deploy the StackSet using the AWS CLI, run the following command:

aws cloudformation create-stack-instances --stack-set-name MyStackSet --accounts 123456789012 234567890123 --regions us-east-1 us-west-2

In this command, replace MyStackSet with the name of your StackSet, 123456789012 and 234567890123 with the AWS account IDs you want to deploy to, and us-east-1 and us-west-2 with the regions you want to deploy to. This will deploy the StackSet to each of the specified accounts and regions.

Step 4: Update the StackSet If you need to update the resources in the StackSet, you can do so using the AWS CLI. To update the StackSet using the AWS CLI, run the following command:

aws cloudformation update-stack-set --stack-set-name MyStackSet --template-body file://stackset.yaml

In this command, replace MyStackSet with the name of your StackSet, and stackset.yaml with the path to your updated CloudFormation template. This will update the StackSet with the new resources defined in the updated CloudFormation template.

Step 5: Delete the StackSet If you no longer need the Stack Set, you can delete it using the AWS CLI. To delete the StackSet using the AWS CLI, run the following command:

aws cloudformation delete-stack-set --stack-set-name MyStackSet

In this command, replace MyStackSet with the name of your StackSet. This will delete the StackSet and all of its associated resources.

That’s it! You’ve now learned how to create, configure, deploy, update, and delete a StackSet using the AWS CLI. AWS CloudFormation StackSets is a powerful feature that can save you time and effort when managing multiple AWS accounts and regions.