Icon source: AWS
AWS Cost Explorer
Cloud Provider: AWS
What is AWS Cost Explorer
AWS Cost Explorer is a web service that allows users to visualize, understand, and manage their Amazon Web Services (AWS) costs and usage over time through detailed reports and analytics.
AWS Cost Explorer is an intuitive and sophisticated web service designed to help users visualize, manage, and optimize their costs and usage over time within the Amazon Web Services (AWS) ecosystem.
With an ever-growing complexity and scale of cloud services, managing costs effectively becomes both a priority and a challenge for businesses. AWS Cost Explorer addresses this need by providing detailed insights into your AWS spending patterns, allowing for more informed decision-making when it comes to budgeting and resource allocation.
At its core, AWS Cost Explorer grants users the ability to analyze their expenses in a granular manner. It does this by aggregating historical usage and cost data, which can span months or even years, depending on the user's requirements. This data is then visualized through easy-to-understand graphs and charts, offering a visual breakdown of where resources are being consumed and identifying trends over time. Such visualization aids in pinpointing exactly where inefficiencies lie, be it in underused instances, regions with higher costs, or services that are more expensive than alternatives.
One of the remarkable features of AWS Cost Explorer is its forecasting capability. The service employs machine learning algorithms to predict future costs based on historical data. This predictive analysis is invaluable for budget planning and for staying ahead of unexpected spending spikes. By understanding potential future expenses, organizations can adjust their strategies accordingly, whether by scaling down resources, purchasing reserved instances for long-term savings, or reallocating budgets to different departments or projects.
Moreover, AWS Cost Explorer allows for a highly customizable experience. Users can filter and group data in various ways, such as by service, linked account, region, or tag, enabling a detailed analysis that aligns with specific business needs. This flexibility ensures that different stakeholders within an organization, from finance teams to project managers, can access relevant information tailored to their requirements. However, the true potential of AWS Cost Explorer is realized when it's used as part of a broader cost management strategy.
Alongside complementary AWS services like Budgets, which enables users to set custom budgetary limits and alerts, and Cost & Usage Report, which provides comprehensive data about your AWS usage and costs, Cost Explorer forms a robust framework for achieving cost efficiency and transparency in cloud operations.
In essence, AWS Cost Explorer is more than just a tool for reviewing past spending. It's a proactive solution that empowers businesses to steer their cloud investments wisely, ensuring that every dollar spent on AWS contributes to the organizationâs growth and success. Through its comprehensive analytics, predictive capabilities, and customizable features, AWS Cost Explorer transforms raw data into actionable intelligence, facilitating smarter, data-driven decisions in the complex and dynamic landscape of cloud computing.
Key AWS Cost Explorer Features
AWS Cost Explorer is a tool that provides visualizations and insights to analyze, track, and optimize Amazon Web Services spending over time.
AWS Cost Explorer features a customizable dashboard that allows users to visualize their AWS spending over time. Users can create custom reports to track costs and usage across different services, accounts, and regions.
This tool provides predictive cost forecasts based on historical data. Users can estimate future spending for up to 12 months, helping in budget planning and cost management.
AWS Cost Explorer analyzes usage patterns to recommend Reserved Instances (RIs) purchases. These recommendations can help users optimize costs by choosing the right RI configurations to match their usage.
Users can categorize and track their AWS costs by applying tags to resources. Cost Explorer utilizes these tags to provide detailed cost breakdowns, facilitating granular cost management and accountability.
Cost Explorer offers API access enabling users to programmatically query their cost and usage data. This feature supports integration with external tools and custom analytics solutions, providing more flexibility in data management and reporting.
Leveraging machine learning, AWS Cost Explorer can identify and alert users to unusual changes in their spending patterns. This feature aids in quickly identifying and addressing unintended or anomalous expenses.
Similar to Reserved Instances, AWS Cost Explorer also provides recommendations for AWS Savings Plans. This helps users to further optimize their costs based on long-term usage commitments.
AWS Cost Explorer allows users to access and analyze up to 12 months of historical AWS cost and usage data. This extensive historical view supports trend analysis and more informed financial decisions.
AWS Cost Explorer Use Cases
AWS Cost Explorer is used for visualizing, understanding, and managing cloud expenses over time through detailed analyses of historical and forecasted AWS usage and costs.
Use AWS Cost Explorer to monitor your monthly AWS spending. It provides detailed insights into where your funds are going across various services, allowing for better budget management and the identification of areas where costs can be optimized.
Identify unutilized or underutilized resources to reduce costs. AWS Cost Explorer helps in spotting instances, volumes, or services that are not being fully utilized, enabling you to make informed decisions on downsizing or terminating them to save on expenses.
Allocate cloud spending to the appropriate departments or projects. With AWS Cost Explorer, you can tag resources accordingly and get detailed reports on usage and spending by department, facilitating accurate billing and internal chargebacks.
Make strategic decisions about purchasing Reserved Instances (RIs) to save money over time. AWS Cost Explorer analyzes your usage patterns to recommend the most cost-effective RIs, helping you to significantly lower your computing costs compared to on-demand rates.
Predict future spending to improve budget planning. AWS Cost Explorer uses historical data to forecast your future AWS bills, giving you insights into how your spending might change based on current usage trends and facilitating more accurate budget allocations.
Services AWS Cost Explorer integrates with
Amazon QuickSight is a business analytics service that you can use to build visualizations, perform ad-hoc analysis, and get business insights from your data. You can connect QuickSight to Cost Explorer for enhanced data visualization and reporting.
AWS Budgets allows you to set custom cost and usage budgets and receive notifications when your usage exceeds your thresholds. You can leverage Cost Explorer data to set and track these budgets.
AWS Organizations enables you to centrally manage and govern your environment as you grow and scale your AWS resources. Cost Explorer can provide cost and usage visibility across your organization, including consolidated billing.
AWS IAM allows you to manage users and permissions in AWS. IAM roles and policies can be configured to control access to Cost Explorer data, ensuring that only authorized users can view cost and usage information.
AWS Cost Explorer pricing models
AWS Cost Explorer is free for basic usage, but advanced features and detailed historical data access beyond the last 12 months may incur additional costs.