Introduction

AWS costs can quickly escalate without proper management. This guide provides actionable strategies to optimize your AWS spending while maintaining performance and reliability.

1. Right-Size Your Resources

Use AWS Cost Explorer and CloudWatch metrics to identify underutilized resources:

  • Review EC2 instance types and sizes
  • Analyze CPU and memory utilization patterns
  • Downsize or terminate idle resources

2. Leverage Reserved Instances and Savings Plans

Commit to 1 or 3-year terms for predictable workloads to save up to 72%:

# Example: Calculate potential savings
aws ce get-reservation-purchase-recommendation \
    --service EC2 \
    --lookback-period-in-days THIRTY_DAYS

3. Use Spot Instances

Spot Instances can reduce costs by up to 90% for fault-tolerant workloads.

4. Optimize S3 Storage

Implement lifecycle policies to transition data to cheaper storage classes:

  • Use S3 Standard for frequently accessed data
  • Move to S3 Infrequent Access (IA) after 30 days
  • Archive to Glacier for long-term storage

5. Delete Unused Resources

Regular cleanup of unused resources:

  • Unattached EBS volumes
  • Elastic IPs not associated with instances
  • Old snapshots
  • Unused load balancers

6. Enable Auto Scaling

Scale resources based on demand to avoid over-provisioning.

Conclusion

Cost optimization is an ongoing process. Regular reviews and adjustments ensure you're getting the most value from your AWS investment.

AWS Cost Optimization FinOps