CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy

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Summary

Full permissions required to use AmazonCloudWatchAgent.

Permissions imported from the AWS Managed Policy Reference Guide; other sections pending editorial review.

Identity

ARN: arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy
Default version: v3
Created: 2018-03-07
Last edited: 2026-11-03
Services: cloudwatch, ec2, logs, ssm, xray

Control-plane actions (12)

By access level: 3 List, 3 Read, 6 Write.

Control-plane actions by service
Service	Granted	Access levels and limits	Granted by
CloudWatch	1 of 160	1 Write; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	cloudwatch:PutProfileRecords
EC2	1 of 834	1 List; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	ec2:DescribeTags
CloudWatch Logs	6 of 133	2 List, 4 Write; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	logs:CreateLogGroup, logs:CreateLogStream, logs:DescribeLogGroups, logs:DescribeLogStreams, logs:PutLogEvents, logs:PutRetentionPolicy
Systems Manager	2 of 164	1 Read, 1 Write; 2 restricted, 0 conditional	ssm:GetParameter, ssm:PutParameter
X-Ray	2 of 32	2 Read; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	xray:GetSamplingRules, xray:GetSamplingStatisticSummaries

CloudWatch: 1 actions

cloudwatch:PutProfileRecords (Write)

EC2: 1 actions

ec2:DescribeTags (List)

CloudWatch Logs: 6 actions

logs:CreateLogGroup (Write)
logs:CreateLogStream (Write)
logs:DescribeLogGroups (List)
logs:DescribeLogStreams (List)
logs:PutLogEvents (Write)
logs:PutRetentionPolicy (Write)

Systems Manager: 2 actions

ssm:GetParameter (Read)
ssm:PutParameter (Write)

X-Ray: 2 actions

xray:GetSamplingRules (Read)
xray:GetSamplingStatisticSummaries (Read)

Data-plane actions (4)

By access level: 1 Read, 3 Write.

Data-plane actions by service
Service	Granted	Access levels and limits	Granted by
CloudWatch	1 of 5	1 Write; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	cloudwatch:PutMetricData
X-Ray	3 of 12	1 Read, 2 Write; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	xray:GetSamplingTargets, xray:PutTelemetryRecords, xray:PutTraceSegments

CloudWatch: 1 actions

cloudwatch:PutMetricData (Write)

X-Ray: 3 actions

xray:GetSamplingTargets (Read)
xray:PutTelemetryRecords (Write)
xray:PutTraceSegments (Write)

Excluded and conditional actions

No patterns are excluded by NotAction or Deny statements.

Resource scope and attachment

Resource scope across granted actions: mixed.

Can be attached: Yes, to users, groups and roles.

Why this tier

Grants 9 write, tagging or permissions-management actions, short of full control of any service.

Guidance

Pending editorial review. The permission data on this page comes straight from AWS; this section will be filled in once a reviewed guide exists.

Same service

Same domain

Frequently asked questions

Pending editorial review. The permission data on this page comes straight from AWS; this section will be filled in once a reviewed guide exists.

Policy JSON

Download policy.json

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Sid": "CWACloudWatchPermissions",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "cloudwatch:PutMetricData",
        "cloudwatch:PutProfileRecords",
        "ec2:DescribeTags",
        "logs:PutLogEvents",
        "logs:PutRetentionPolicy",
        "logs:DescribeLogStreams",
        "logs:DescribeLogGroups",
        "logs:CreateLogStream",
        "logs:CreateLogGroup",
        "xray:PutTraceSegments",
        "xray:PutTelemetryRecords",
        "xray:GetSamplingRules",
        "xray:GetSamplingTargets",
        "xray:GetSamplingStatisticSummaries"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    },
    {
      "Sid": "CWASSMPermissions",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "ssm:GetParameter",
        "ssm:PutParameter"
      ],
      "Resource": "arn:aws:ssm:*:*:parameter/AmazonCloudWatch-*"
    }
  ]
}

Version history

Current version v3, edited by AWS on 2026-11-03. Version history is recorded from 2026-11-11. Earlier versions are in the IAM console under Policy versions.

Attach snippets

AWS CLI

aws iam attach-role-policy --role-name ROLE_NAME --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy
aws iam attach-user-policy --user-name USER_NAME --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy
aws iam attach-group-policy --group-name GROUP_NAME --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy

CloudFormation

Resources:
  ExampleRole:
    Type: AWS::IAM::Role
    Properties:
      AssumeRolePolicyDocument: {}  # replace with your trust policy
      ManagedPolicyArns:
        - arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy

Terraform

resource "aws_iam_role_policy_attachment" "cloudwatchagentadminpolicy" {
  role       = aws_iam_role.example.name
  policy_arn = "arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy"
}

CDK (TypeScript)

role.addManagedPolicy(
  iam.ManagedPolicy.fromAwsManagedPolicyName("CloudWatchAgentAdminPolicy"),
);

Sources

Pending editorial review. No editorial sources are listed yet.