MSK Replicator now supports replication from external Apache Kafka clusters to MSK Express Brokers

Amazon MSK Replicator now supports data replication from external Apache Kafka clusters—including on-premises, self-managed on AWS, or other cloud providers—to Amazon MSK Express brokers. This capability simplifies workload migration to MSK Express Brokers, supports disaster recovery by using MSK Express-based clusters as a failover or backup target, and enables data distribution across hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

MSK Replicator is a feature of Amazon MSK that automates data replication between Kafka clusters, eliminating the need to manage custom replication infrastructure or configure open-source tools. MSK Express brokers are designed to deliver up to 3 times more throughput per broker, scale up to 20 times faster, and reduce recovery time by 90 percent as compared to Standard brokers running Apache Kafka. With this launch, you can now use MSK Replicator to replicate data from external Kafka clusters to Express brokers on Amazon MSK. You can also use MSK Replicator to replicate data from Amazon MSK Express to external Kafka clusters for reliable failback or multi-cloud data distribution. Unlike self-managed replication tools, MSK Replicator lets you retain your original Kafka topic names during replication while automatically avoiding infinite replication loops. It also synchronizes consumer group offsets bidirectionally, enabling you to move producers and consumers across clusters independently, in any order, without coordination constraints or the risk of data loss.

This new capability is supported in all AWS Regions where MSK Express brokers are available.

Watch a demo on YouTube to see it in action, or visit the MSK Replicator documentation, product page, pricing page, and this AWS blog post to learn more.