What is an AWS Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) peering connection?

A Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) peering connection is a networking connection that allows two separate VPCs to communicate with each other using private IPv4 or IPv6 addresses. This allows resources in one VPC to access resources in another VPC as if they were part of the same network. VPC peering is an essential feature within AWS that facilitates communication between different VPCs within the same region or across different regions, without exposing the traffic to the public internet, thus maintaining high security and performance.

With VPC peering, you can directly route traffic between VPCs, making it particularly useful in scenarios where applications or services need to communicate with each other but reside in different VPCs. This is common in multi-tier applications or when separating environments such as development and production, where resources need to communicate but should remain isolated for security or compliance reasons.

By enabling the use of private IP addresses for routing traffic between the VPCs, VPC peering alleviates the need for complex routing configurations or the use of VPN connections, simplifying network architecture within AWS.