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Topic 7: Cloud Billing and Cost Management

⏱️ Estimated time: 2-3 days

Cloud services are billed based on consumption. Every VM, database, and API call has a cost. In this topic, you'll learn to monitor spending, set up cost alerts, and estimate expenses before deploying infrastructure. These skills prevent surprise bills and teach you to make cost-aware architecture decisions.

📚 Learning Path​

Core Concepts​

  1. Pay-as-you-go pricing: You're charged for what you use, not upfront
  2. Resource types have different costs: VMs, storage, data transfer all priced differently
  3. Regional pricing varies: Same resource costs different amounts in different regions
  4. Billing cycles: Usually monthly. Charges appear in your bill 24-48 hours after use
  • Study

Cost Management Overview​

Azure | AWS | GCP

Budgeting & Alerts​

Azure | AWS | GCP

Pricing Calculators​

Azure | AWS | GCP

🧪 Test Your Knowledge​

Once you've reviewed the resources, test your understanding with these prompts:

  1. Your cloud bill is higher than expected. How would you investigate which resource is causing the cost increase?
  2. You're deploying an application that will serve 1,000 users. How would you estimate the monthly cost?
  3. How would you set up a budget alert to notify you if spending exceeds $50/month?
  4. How would you determine how much it would cost to run a VM 24/7 for one month?
  5. Why is it important to understand what resources are running in your cloud account?
  6. How would you optimize costs for a development environment vs. a production environment?

🛠️ Hands-on Task​

Set up cost monitoring for your cloud infrastructure:

  • Review your current month's charges in the billing dashboard
  • Identify potential cost saving opportunities in your current spending
  • Set up a budget alert for $50/month (or your chosen limit)

✅ Topic Checklist​

Before moving on, make sure you have:

  • Understood how cloud billing and consumption-based pricing works
  • Reviewed your cloud provider's billing structure
  • Logged into your billing dashboard and reviewed current costs
  • Created a budget and set up cost alerts
  • Used the pricing calculator to estimate costs
  • Reviewed cost optimization strategies (stopping unused resources, right-sizing instances)