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Knowledge Base

AWS Optimization
Field Guide

Battle-tested strategies and technical implementations for reducing AWS costs. Written by infrastructure experts, for engineering teams.

13

Expert Guides

8

AWS Services

30-70%

Potential Cost Reduction

EBS

2 guides

Elastic Block Store efficiency for volumes, snapshots, and data lifecycle management

Unattached EBS Volumes
How to find unattached EBS volumes? EBS volumes in 'available' state continue billing storage costs even when not attached to any instance. These orphaned volumes can be safely deleted after verification.
2 min read
Old EBS Snapshots
How to manage old EBS snapshots? EBS snapshots aged over 6 months accumulate storage costs at $0.05/GB/month and should be reviewed for deletion based on backup retention requirements.
2 min read

EC2

2 guides

Elastic Compute Cloud optimization strategies for instances, scaling, and resource allocation

Idle EC2 Instances
How to identify idle EC2 instances? EC2 instances using under 5% CPU consistently over the last 24 hours are effectively idle and can be stopped or terminated to eliminate compute waste.
2 min read
Oversized EC2 Instances
How to identify oversized EC2 instances? EC2 instances using under 20% CPU consistently can be downsized to save 30-70% on compute costs without performance impact.
2 min read

EIP

1 guides

Elastic IP resource management and optimization

Unused Elastic IPs
How to find unused Elastic IP addresses? Elastic IP addresses not attached to running instances cost $3.60/month each and should be released immediately to stop charges.
2 min read

Lambda

1 guides

Serverless function optimization for cost and performance

Oversized Lambda Functions
How to identify over-provisioned Lambda functions? Lambda functions using under 20% of timeout duration with memory 1024MB or higher are over-provisioned and can save 30-70% on execution costs through rightsizing.
2 min read

LoadBalancer

1 guides

Application and Network Load Balancer optimization for traffic management

Unused Load Balancers
How to identify unused load balancers? Load balancers with zero healthy targets across all target groups cost $16-33/month in base charges while serving no traffic and should be deleted immediately.
2 min read

NATGateway

1 guides

NAT Gateway optimization for managed network address translation services

Unused NAT Gateways
How to identify unused NAT Gateways? NAT Gateways processing under 1GB per day cost $32-45/month in base charges for minimal traffic and should be evaluated for removal or consolidation.
2 min read

RDS

2 guides

Relational Database Service cost optimization for managed database instances

Idle RDS Instances
How to identify idle RDS database instances? RDS instances with zero database connections over 24 hours are consuming compute costs without serving any workloads and can be safely stopped or terminated.
2 min read
Oversized RDS Instances
How to identify oversized RDS instances? RDS instances using under 20% CPU consistently over 14 days can be downsized to save 40-60% on database costs without performance impact.
2 min read

S3

3 guides

Simple Storage Service cost control and intelligent tiering strategies

S3 Lifecycle Optimization
How to optimize S3 storage costs? S3 buckets with objects older than 90 days can save 50-80% on storage costs by automatically transitioning to cheaper IA and Glacier storage classes.
2 min read
Incomplete S3 Multipart Uploads
How to clean up incomplete S3 multipart uploads? Failed S3 multipart uploads leave orphaned storage parts that cost $2-50+ monthly each while providing no accessible data and should be cleaned up immediately.
2 min read
Empty S3 Buckets
How to identify empty S3 buckets? Empty S3 buckets cost ~$1/month each in management overhead and should be deleted immediately as they serve no purpose.
2 min read

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