This article introduces Express brokers, a new broker type for Amazon Managed Streaming for Apache Kafka (Amazon MSK) designed to deliver high throughput and faster scaling for Kafka clusters.

Specifically, the article covers:

• Key features and benefits of Express brokers, including hands-free storage management, higher throughput per broker, faster scaling, and faster recovery
• Comparison of Express brokers to Standard brokers and MSK Serverless in terms of configuration flexibility, cluster rebalancing, capacity management, and storage management
• Getting started with Express brokers, including sizing recommendations and creating a cluster with Express brokers
• Scaling Express broker clusters vertically and horizontally, with an example showing 90% faster partition reassignment compared to Standard brokers
• Additional information on data migration, monitoring, security, availability, and pricing for Express brokers