AWS Knowledge
Understanding Amazon CloudWatch Pricing and Costs
Piyush Kalra
Nov 9, 2024
Amazon Web Services grants access to applications that are regarded as some of the world’s most powerful and data-hungry. As such, you have probably heard of Amazon CloudWatch, the AWS monitoring and observability solution. It comes with great advantages; however, trying to understand its pricing structure feels somewhat like being in a maze.
This guide aims to break down Amazon CloudWatch pricing so that you can better understand costs, stay within budget, and make sound decisions that are best for your business. In the course of this article, we will indeed cover a wide range of topics, from operational practices to breakdowns and even a cost optimization case study.
What is Amazon CloudWatch?
Amazon CloudWatch is a toolkit for monitoring in the cloud. It provides the user with the ability to aggregate, analyze, and manage metrics, logs, and even events from Hybrid and pure cloud-based setups. This results in the user being able to identify problems and solutions in an operational aspect quicker and more efficiently, knowing how difficult the entire environment is to work with.
Key Features
Monitoring: Tracks metrics such as the level of CPU use, amount of memory, or number of requests sent.
Logging: Collects and consolidates application-negative logs to highlight the trends and the limits for diagnosing.
Alarms: Provides alerts on certain operational thresholds and any abnormal behaviour.
Dashboards: Shows metrics regarding performance and all other indicators in real-time.
Integration: Combines numerous AWS services such as EC2, Lambda, S3 and many others effortlessly.
Container Monitoring Insights & Anomaly Detection: This service provides knowledge on how the container acts and detects dysfunctions in its work.
Using this feature, you have the opportunity to make effective decisions to increase performance, save on expenditures, or carry out any other relevant activity. It offers a global perspective on all of its AWS services, which aids in the diagnosis of failures and the operation of applications.
How Amazon CloudWatch Works
Amazon CloudWatch is a monitoring service that collects operational data from EC2 instances, on-premises systems, and third-party applications. Here are some features and how it integrates with other AWS resources.
Data Collection: CloudWatch has the ability to retrieve metrics, logs and event data from various sources. It enables AWS services to trigger the usage of metrics.
Processing: Information is passed through API calls and can be stored and processed in volumetric and temporal real-time. Statistics are usable, and the data presented in the Cloudwatch console can be graphed.
User Interface: Cloudwatch Console fully integrates an EC2 instance cost management capability through dashboards, alarms, and metrics graphs. The console allows alarm action configuration that can change the state of EC2 instances or invoke Auto Scaling and SNS actions.
Deep Dive into Amazon CloudWatch Pricing Structure
CloudWatch pricing is rather deeply understood if you want to maximize the benefit of the service without going overboard. Here’s a
1. CloudWatch Metrics
Standard Metrics (EC2 and S3 services are free of charge): CPU utilization or Lambda invocations count among the default AWS Metrics that are offered with no extra payment if other AWS resources are in use.
Custom Metrics ($0.30 a month per metric onward): These are user-created metrics that are external to AWS services/applications which need-app calls to CloudWatch (e.g performance metrics for specific apps). The metrics have the potential to become an enormous cost center.
Resolution-Based Pricing: The more data points, the higher the cost.
💡 Cost-Saving Tip: Use fewer custom metrics and batch multiple requests using `StatisticSet` to reduce API calls and costs.
2. CloudWatch Alarms
Free Tier: Allows up to 10 free alarms.
Standard Alarms: The costs incurred are worth $0.10 per metric on a per alarm monthly basis in US East (N. Virginia) region.which is ideal for the basic monitoring setup.
Composite Alarms: These alarms are more expensive than the rest but are useful for many complex use cases as they lower the total number of individual alarms by combining logic.
Notifications: In the same region, SNS incurs a charge of $0.50 for every million notifications sent out.
3. CloudWatch Logs
CloudWatch includes charges for log data ingestion, log storage, and log insights. It is noted that if log management is done well, it encourages cost control especially in cases of startups. It is crucial to investigate the event-driven pricing models.
Log Ingestion:
Free Tier: 5 GB of logs ingested within the first month; does not require any payment.
Standard Ingestion: $0.50/GB in US East (N. Virginia) once the limit is crossed during the free phase, whereas for rare access logs, the cost is reduced to $0.25/GB.
Log Storage:
Free Tier: 5 GB of logs are available for free throughout the month.
After Free Tier: If a location is in Northern Virginia it will cost $0.03/compressive GB/month with 0.15 ratio.
Log Analysis:
Insights Tool: There is a cost incurred which is $0.005/GB of data scanned in case of US East.
💡 Cost-Saving Tip: Lower retention policies for log data can significantly reduce the cost incurred during storage. Reframe your log management plan for efficient use of cloud and extraction of worthwhile insights.
4. CloudWatch Dashboards
Free Tier: This feature helps build up to 3 dashboards in a month.
Additional dashboards: One can be able to build 3 more additional dashboards in US East following the N Virginia region. However, there is an additional charge of 3 dollars per each dashboard built.
Additional Charges: Apply to APIs such as PutDashboard.
Extra Costs: There are extra costs which are applied on more than 10 extra dashboards. There will be an increase in costs due to sending more notifications along with monitoring more metrics.
5. API Requests and Data Transfers
When performing such operations as ‘PutMetricData’, or transferring data from one AWS region to another results in cost incurrence.
Free Tier
The AWS free tier aims to assist you in starting from scratch without having to spend anything upfront. Here’s what you can avail of for free infinitely:
10 custom metrics
10 alarms
1,000,000 API requests
5 gigabytes of ingested logs and 5 gigabytes of archived logs
3 dashboards that can support up to 50 metrics each
The free tier is reasonably generous; in fact, there are enough resources for you to experiment with and determine whether a paid plan is worth the investment.
Regional Pricing Variability
The cost of CloudWatch differs by region. Let’s assume a service is sold for $0.30 per GB of data in N.Virginia (US East) and $0.45 in Tokyo (Asia Pacific). If one uses 100 GB of data, N.Virginia's cost would be 100GB x $0.30/GB = $30. In Tokyo, however, it would be 100GB x $0.45/GB = $45. So, a customer residing in N. Virginia could potentially save herself $15 by avoiding services in Tokyo.
Additional Pricing Benefits
Managing and containing expenses is also included in the Amazon CloudWatch functionality.
1. Usage-Based Pricing
With no upfront payments, and pay-as-you-use options, you would only be billed for what you use. This sort of option guarantees cost-effective service whether for start-up companies or large corporations for instance Cloud Watch.
2. Reserved Discounts
Although they primarily relate to EC2 instances, on-reserve deals can also, in brief, help monitoring costs over a long duration of time.
3. AWS Cost Explorer
This is utilized in setting up this trend, including tracking the history of AWS cloud purchases including calling for future trends as well.
Case Study: How Tech Mahindra Enhanced Its Capabilities with Amazon CloudWatch
The time is ripe for Tech Mahindra to improve customer applications by using the Amazon Cloud Watch Internet Monitor. The application reduces troubleshooting by 30% through the use of CloudWatch Logs. Besides, the Internet Monitor metric provides parameters so that custom alarms can be created for client use cases and to prevent faults through active monitoring of the AWS in various countries.
Evidently, Amazon CloudWatch goes a long way in reducing production risk by 25% by allowing monitoring and managing vulnerabilities, a core responsible feature, and providing feedback that allows gradual implementation of measures.
The cross-account observability in CloudWatch helps rationalize the processes by providing a single view for F500 customers to control multiple accounts and integrate monitoring and RCA strategies for rational composite mechanisms.
Results Achieved:
Achieved target of reducing troubleshooting and RCA for client’s applications to 30%.
Evidently, it decreased production risk by 25%.
Managed multiple accounts and environments in a more efficient and streamlined manner.
Developed an enterprise-level solution in a standard format.
Tools and Tips for Cutting Amazon CloudWatch Costs
To optimize the amount of resources you consume on CloudWatch usage, take these methods into consideration.
1. Set Spend Alerts
Due to the ability to set up alarms, bills may now be viewed in a creative fashion, providing greater control over financial aspects; however, they still owe some portion of the CloudWatch bill.
2. Optimize Custom Metrics
By adhering to a specific number of custom metrics on a selected time period, one can lower the amount of data that needs to be processed and, thus, the amount of money wasted unnecessarily.
3. Leverage Log Retention Policies
When a strategic purpose is set for a log, and the log is no longer used or, per the policy, can be deleted, the longer retention time is set, the more expenditure is saved through storage.
4. Use Free Tier Where Possible
The free tier can be used to help supplement income so that one can utilize the resources instead of paying for an additional service.
5. Optimize Your CloudWatch Costs with Pump
Ending up managing costs will be a challenge as every other AWS product, including CloudWatch, operates on demand, which means the price changes according to the metrics used, for example, in the case of logs being increased due to the customer using an application that is in an updated state.
With PUMP, CloudWatch cost optimization are automated, enabling seventy per cent savings on AWS. It also enables cost planning and monitoring because it allows engineers or FinOps teams to see cost alerts.
PUMP gives a more comprehensive view of cloud expenses. We cut costs on CloudWatch and save on EC2, RDS, ECS, etc. Look at this blog for a complete list of reductions.
For instance, PUMP can even bring the price of Cloud Watch from $100 down to $70, making tremendous changes in budget performance.
Control your Amazon CloudWatch Expenses
Amazon CloudWatch is, without a doubt a great and flexible monitoring tool. However, if abandoned without managing its expenses, expenses can stack up fast. For instance, if you are a cloud developer who is monitoring the performance of infrastructure or a DevOps engineer who optimizes core applications, it’s essential that you know the CloudWatch expenses beforehand in order to control the costs.
Happy computing!
