#GroundUp: The Art of AWS Billing Alerts
Welcome back to the #GroundUp series. You can find the very first listing of posts within the series here. Managing your AWS costs is essential to keeping your cloud expenses under control. AWS billing alerts are a crucial tool to help you monitor your usage and spending so that you can avoid unexpected charges and optimize your cloud resources. For anyone starting in the cloud, this becomes very essential as I have seen many of my students max out their Free Tier and have charges racked up to their cards. This can easily be avoided if you take note to set some alerts and assign corresponding actions when a threshold is met.
In this blog post, we’ll walk through the steps to set up billing alerts and provide insights into best practices for managing your AWS budget effectively.
Prerequisites
Before we dive into setting up billing alerts, ensure you have an AWS account, with access to AWS billing services. This can be the root user(which is strongly advised against using for daily tasks) or an IAM user with permission to access billing information.
Step 1: Sign in to the AWS Management Console
1. Go to the AWS Management Console.
2. Sign into your AWS account using your credentials.
Step 2: Access AWS Billing and Cost Management
1. In the AWS Management Console, click on your account name at the top right-hand corner of the page.
2. From the dropdown menu, select “My Billing Dashboard”. This will take you to the AWS Billing and Cost Management Dashboard.
Step 3: Set Up a Billing Alarm
Now, let’s create a billing alarm to receive alerts when your AWS costs exceed a specified threshold.
1. In the AWS Billing and Cost Management Dashboard, click on “Budgets” in the left-hand menu.
2. Select the “Create budget” button.
3. There are two options in setting up the budget;
a. “Use a template (simplified)”
b. “Customize (advanced)”
4. In our case, we would use the template, as it would provide the template for the Zero spend. This will alert us if we spend above $0.01 in our console.
5. Configure your budget settings:
· Budget name: Provide a name for the budget.
· Email recipients: Provide email address that will be contacted if the budget is exceeded.
6. Review your budget settings and click “Create budget” to create the budget.
Step 4: Monitor Your Budget
With the budget and billing alert set, you can easily monitor your spending more effectively.
1. In the AWS Billing and Cost Management Dashboard, go to the Budgets section.
2. You will find the newly created budget listed. You can click on it to view the budget details, spending history, and any associated alerts.
3. As your usage and spending increase, you’ll receive notifications when your costs approach or exceed the budgeted amount.
Step 5: Fine-Tune Your Budget and Alerts
AWS provides flexibility in managing your budgets and alerts. Here are a few tips to optimize your budget monitoring:
· Adjust your budget: There is always the option to adjust the budget to meet your changing needs and requirements.
· Customize alerts: In addition you can chain multiple alerts to keep up to speed on spending.
· Explore advanced features: You can also look at advanced AWS services like the AWS Cost Explorer for a detailed analysis of your costs.
Conclusion
Setting up AWS billing alerts is a proactive way to manage your cloud expenses and prevent unexpected bills. By following the steps outlined in this post I hope you have learned a few things to help you on your cloud journey.
AWS provides multiple options to gain insights into your spending patterns so be free to explore and fine-tune your budgets. Free to explore and fine-tune your budgeting strategy as your AWS usage evolves.
Thanks for joining and I hope you learned something. Feel free to leave your comments below And I hope to see you in the next post in the #GroundUp series. Take a look at the resources below to get a deeper understanding and appreciation of Cost Optimization in AWS.
References and Further Reading
- The Frugal Architect — https://thefrugalarchitect.com/
AWS re:Invent 2023 — Keynote with Dr. Werner Vogels — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTRBVPvzt9w - Architecture Best Practices for Cost Optimization — https://aws.amazon.com/architecture/cost-optimization/
- AWS Cost Explorer — https://aws.amazon.com/aws-cost-management/aws-cost-explorer/
- AWS Cost Optimization Series — https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhr1KZpdzukcxUPo44KHv2lkRG4NToQXJ
- AWS Cost Optimization Series — https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhr1KZpdzukcxUPo44KHv2lkRG4NToQXJ
