What is the term for a temporary cloud instance that does not persist?

The term for a temporary cloud instance that does not persist is "ephemeral instance." An ephemeral instance is designed to exist only for a short duration. When it is terminated, any data stored in that instance is typically lost, as the instance does not maintain any persistent storage. This approach is beneficial for tasks that require short-lived compute resources, such as web hosting for variable workloads or batch processing jobs, where maintaining a permanent instance would be unnecessary and cost-inefficient.

In cloud computing, this concept allows developers and operators to spin up instances when needed and dispose of them afterward, facilitating efficient resource utilization and cost management. The nature of ephemeral instances is particularly suitable for serverless architectures, microservices, and environments where scalability is essential.

Other terms like "permanent instance," "static instance," and "dynamic instance" do not capture this transient nature and instead imply a level of permanence or ongoing state retention that is inconsistent with the nature of ephemeral instances.