Introduction
In the world of multi-account AWS environments, AWS provides two powerful solutions to streamline governance, security, and compliance: AWS Control Tower and the Landing Zone Accelerator (LZA). While both aim to simplify complex enterprise setups, they serve slightly different purposes. This blog explores when to use AWS Control Tower alone, when to combine it with LZA, and how to decide what best suits your organization.
Identifying the Problem or Need
As organizations expand their cloud footprints, managing multiple AWS accounts becomes a balancing act of speed, security, and compliance. AWS Control Tower was built to help solve this by enabling fast, best-practice-aligned multi-account setups. However, many enterprises soon find that Control Tower’s out-of-the-box features fall short when complex regulatory needs or deep customization is required.
As cloud adoption accelerates, many organizations are finding that simply migrating to the cloud is no longer enough. The challenge today is governing that infrastructure in a secure, scalable, and compliant way—especially in industries that are tightly regulated.
According to a 2023 Gartner report, 60% of enterprises struggle with aligning their cloud infrastructure with regulatory frameworks such as HIPAA, NIST 800-53, ISO 27001, and GDPR. The complexity grows exponentially when organizations operate across multiple business units, regions, or cloud environments.
These struggles typically stem from:
- Fragmented cloud operations: Multiple accounts and environments without centralized governance led to inconsistencies and potential compliance gaps.
- Manual policy enforcement: Without automation, enforcing and auditing compliance becomes resource-intensive and error-prone.
- Lack of standardization: Teams often build their own environments, creating siloed and non-compliant infrastructures.
For sectors like finance, healthcare, and the public sector, this isn’t just a technical inconvenience—it’s a legal and reputational risk. Regulatory non-compliance can lead to hefty fines, data breaches, and loss of customer trust.
For instance, violations of the GDPR can cost companies up to €20 million or 4% of annual global turnover, whichever is greater. In the U.S., HIPAA violations can range from $100 to $50,000 per incident, with a maximum annual penalty of $1.5 million.
The urgency for cloud landing zones that are not just functional but secure and compliance-ready out of the box has never been more pronounced. These landing zones must offer:
- Policy-as-code governance
- Centralized identity and logging
- Continuous compliance monitoring
- Audit-ready configurations
And this is exactly where solutions like AWS Control Tower and the Landing Zone Accelerator (LZA) step in—helping organizations move beyond ad hoc architectures to enterprise-grade cloud foundations that scale securely and meet evolving regulatory demands.
Insights and Solutions
AWS Control Tower offers an easy way to set up and govern a secure, multi-account AWS environment based on AWS best practices. It automates the provisioning of accounts, applies preventive and detective controls (called guardrails), and provides visibility through AWS Organizations.
Ideal When:
- Organizations want a quick, guided setup of a secure AWS environment.
- Basic governance and security are sufficient.
- Minimal custom compliance requirements.
- Fast time-to-value is prioritized over deep customization.
The Landing Zone Accelerator on AWS is a comprehensive solution designed to help you deploy and operate a secure, scalable, and compliant landing zone. It extends Control Tower with enhanced compliance alignment (e.g., NIST, CIS, HIPAA, GDPR), additional security services, and customizable modules for networking, logging, and identity.
Ideal When:
- Regulatory compliance is a must (e.g., financial services, healthcare).
- You need advanced networking, logging, and security configurations.
- Your organization has multi-region, global, or hybrid cloud requirements.
Can You Enable LZA on an Existing AWS Control Tower Deployment?
Yes, you can deploy LZA on top of an existing AWS Control Tower environment. In fact, LZA is designed to complement Control Tower rather than replace it. When layered on top, it brings additional security, compliance, and customization capabilities.
Benefits of Adding LZA on Existing Control Tower:
- Enhances compliance posture through templates and automation.
- Provides deeper observability via centralized logging and monitoring.
- Enables deployment of custom configurations and integrations.
- Integrates with AWS Security services like Macie, Guard Duty, and AWS Config.
Complexities to Consider:
- Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and CDK Complexity: LZA is built using AWS CDK, which means your teams need to be comfortable with code-based deployments, including version control, pipeline integration, and rollback strategies.
- Custom Module Integration: Pre-existing AWS Control Tower setups might require you to retrofit or integrate modules carefully to avoid misconfigurations. Proper mapping between modules and Control Tower accounts is essential.
- Account Reconfiguration: Many LZA components assume certain baselines in account configuration (e.g., centralized logging buckets, specific IAM roles). Without these, deployment will either fail or result in inconsistent states.
- Multi-team Coordination: Coordinating between DevOps, Security, Governance, and Compliance teams is critical, as LZA introduces infrastructure and security changes that span multiple departments.
- Change Management Overhead: LZA may redefine how changes are managed, introducing enforced automation and policy as code. Organizations without DevSecOps practices may face friction in adopting this model.
Comparison Table: AWS Control Tower vs. LZA with Control Tower
| Category | AWS Control Tower Only | Control Tower + LZA |
| Setup Complexity | Low – Simplified GUI-based setup; no coding required; minimal configuration. Great for teams with limited cloud experience. | Medium to High – Requires AWS CDK, strong IaC practices, and deep knowledge of AWS services. Involves custom pipelines and testing. |
| Compliance Coverage | Basic AWS Best Practices – Includes foundational security controls but may not satisfy industry-specific standards. | Industry-grade (NIST, HIPAA, etc.) – Helps achieve rigorous compliance and audit readiness through reference architectures and templates. |
| Customization | Limited – Control Tower provides predefined blueprints and limited flexibility in guardrails and account structure. | Extensive – LZA uses modular templates and enables organizations to define custom network, identity, and logging strategies. |
| Security & Monitoring | Foundational – Basic security posture with logs and controls. Good starting point but lacks depth for enterprise needs. | Advanced – Deploys advanced security controls, centralized log collection, alerting pipelines, and continuous compliance monitoring. |
| Multi-region Support | Basic – Supports creating accounts in multiple regions but not optimized for global policy propagation. | Designed for multi-region/global setups – Ideal for managing regulatory and operational consistency across regions. |
| Use Case Example | Startup or SMB with moderate security needs and limited cloud staff. Wants speed over granularity. | Enterprise with strict compliance – Needs granular control, centralized security posture, and consistent configuration across many regions. |
| Governance | Out-of-the-box guardrails – Control Tower imposes static guardrails and policies, with limited extensibility. | Custom controls and policies supported – Enables tailored policy-as-code deployments using AWS Config, SCPs, and IAM boundaries. |
| Skillset Needed | Basic AWS knowledge – Ideal for IT admins, DevOps beginners, and small teams. | Intermediate to advanced – Requires expertise in cloud architecture, security engineering, and DevSecOps practices. |
| Use Cases | A retail startup launching multiple applications on AWS, looking for minimal setup and basic governance. A mid-size SaaS provider with DevOps culture needing fast AWS account provisioning. A university IT department building separate environments for different research projects. | A healthcare company needing HIPAA, HITRUST, and SOC2 compliance. A financial institution managing regional data residency and advanced security controls. A global enterprise seeking uniform security posture across multi-region deployments. A public sector organization with FISMA or FedRAMP requirements. |
Key Points to Keep in Mind
For Control Tower Alone:
- Limited Guardrail Flexibility: You’re confined to the predefined guardrails and blueprints. Custom policies are difficult to implement.
- No Deep Compliance Mapping: AWS Control Tower does not align automatically with complex regulatory controls like NIST 800-53 or HIPAA.
- Fast Time to Value: Ideal when speed and simplicity are more important than custom security and compliance.
- Ideal for Greenfield Projects: Best suited for new workloads rather than retrofitting complex enterprise structures.
For Control Tower with LZA:
- Customizable Compliance Frameworks: LZA maps infrastructure controls to regulatory frameworks, reducing audit effort.
- Higher Operational Maturity Required: Teams must manage code, security pipelines, and operate in a GitOps model.
- Supports Scalable, Repeatable Patterns: Great for organizations deploying at scale across multiple business units or geographies.
- Enforces Centralized Logging and Governance: Improves visibility and accountability by defaulting to centralized mechanisms.
Conclusion
AWS Control Tower offers a great starting point for organizations looking to establish governance and control with minimal effort and quick provisioning. However, when regulatory requirements increase or security and customization become critical, layering the Landing Zone Accelerator on top brings unmatched flexibility and depth.
If you’re a startup or small business that needs to get started quickly, Control Tower alone will serve you well. But if you’re operating in a regulated industry or managing workloads across regions and teams, the combination of Control Tower and LZA provides a scalable, compliant, and future-proof landing zone foundation.
Make your decision based on the complexity of your organization, the industry regulations you must meet, and the operational maturity of your cloud teams.
