12 · Cost Management Tools — Revise

Cost · 20% · Compressed recall. Read the Learn guide first.

Tool → need

Need	Tool
Analyze/visualize/forecast spend & trends	Cost Explorer
Alert on actual/forecasted threshold	AWS Budgets
Most granular line-item data (to S3)	Cost and Usage Report (CUR)
Recommendations (cost + 4 other pillars)	Trusted Advisor
Right-sizing from utilization	Compute Optimizer
Attribute cost to team/project	Cost allocation tags
One bill + shared RI/SP discounts	Organizations consolidated billing

"Email me when spend exceeds/forecast to exceed"  → Budgets
"Chart/trend of spend by service"                 → Cost Explorer
"Most granular resource/hour billing data"        → CUR → Athena/QuickSight
"What idle/underutilized resources to remove?"    → Trusted Advisor
"Cost by department (chargeback)"                 → Cost allocation tags
"One bill, volume + shared discounts"             → Consolidated billing

Flashcards

Cost Explorer vs Budgets?

Cost Explorer = analyze/visualize/forecast. Budgets = proactively alert when actual/forecasted spend crosses a threshold.

Most granular billing data for custom analysis?

Cost and Usage Report (CUR), delivered to S3, queried with Athena/Redshift/QuickSight.

Which forecasts AND alerts on a forecasted breach?

AWS Budgets.

Recommendations for idle/underutilized resources?

Trusted Advisor (full checks need Business/Enterprise Support). Compute Optimizer for right-sizing specifics.

Break down cost by project/team?

Activate cost allocation tags, then group by them in Cost Explorer/CUR.

One bill for many accounts + shared RI/SP discounts?

AWS Organizations consolidated billing.

Common traps

• Cost Explorer analyzes; Budgets alerts. "Alert on threshold/forecast" = Budgets.
• CUR = raw granular data to S3, not a dashboard.
• Trusted Advisor = recommendations (5 pillars); full set needs Business/Enterprise Support.
• Cost allocation tags for chargeback; consolidated billing for shared discounts.
• Compute Optimizer = right-sizing.