AWS Cost Explorer Recipes

Understanding and managing AWS cloud costs can be a complex task for engineers, akin to deciphering a detailed recipe with numerous ingredients. AWS Cost Explorer is a tool that can help break down costs by providing insights into various services, charge types, and usage patterns, although it may require additional permissions and incur extra charges itself. Key strategies include filtering costs by instance ID, understanding the EC2-Other category, utilizing AWS credits, leveraging cost allocation tags, and grouping by tags to better track expenditures. Additionally, users can monitor instance usage hours, forecast reserved instance costs, and evaluate savings plans for financial commitments. Vantage offers features that enhance Cost Explorer's capabilities, such as presenting EC2-Other costs more clearly and providing tools to manage savings plans, while emphasizing the importance of setting permissions correctly, especially in organizations with multiple AWS accounts, to streamline billing processes through AWS Organizations’ Consolidated Billing.