Your AWS Account Costs may Increase in 2024
Managing cloud costs requires constant vigilance, and 2024 brings new potential charges from AWS that could impact your budget.
This blog post explores two key changes and offers actionable tips to keep your spending in check.
In a previous blog post, I mention how you can optimize your costs by automating the start and stop of your EC2 and RDS instances based on the schedules.
It’s not a secret that cost is a crucial aspect when it comes to the Cloud.
Nowadays the big cloud platforms provide a wide range of tools that you can quickly deploy and scale resources as needed. If you don’t take control of that it can result in unpleasant surprises for your wallet when the bill arrives.
AWS recognizes the importance of this matter. One of the pillars of the AWS Well-Architected Framework is Cost Optimization, containing guidance and best practices on how to use AWS products efficiently and at the lowest cost possible.
The topic is so significant that there’s even a discipline (FinOps) dedicated to using the Cloud efficiently without financial waste, with maximum possible efficiency. It’s an ongoing effort that requires continuous monitoring and adjustments.
In 2023, AWS made some announcements that can directly impact the costs for its customers in 2024 if proper precautions are not taken. It involves new charges and a new “service” that may be automatically billed if actions are not taken.
Public IPv4 Address Charge
Effective on February 1, 2024, there will be a charge of $0.005 per IP per hour for all public IPv4 addresses, whether attached to a service or not (there was already a charge for public IPv4 addresses you allocate in your account but don’t attach to an EC2 instance).
This is an indirect way for AWS to “encourage” the adoption of IPv6, as they state that IPv4 prices have increased more than 300% over the past 5 years due to scarcity.
More information about the new charge can be found on AWS website.
Actionable Tips:
- Review resources: Identify resources in public subnets and consider migrating to private subnets or IPv6.
- Optimize allocation: Use tools like “Public IP Insights” to gain insights and optimize public IPv4 address usage.
Extended Support Service for EKS and RDS
Commercial and open-source software operates on a lifecycle. When a new version is released, it will be supported and receive fixes for a certain period. Users are expected to update the software to newer versions before the end of this period. If not, the user assumes the risk of using an old version susceptible to bugs and security vulnerabilities.
AWS has introduced the Extended Support Service for EKS, the managed Kubernetes service, and for RDS, the relational database service.
For RDS, extended support will be available for MySQL and PostgreSQL, including Aurora. With this service, AWS will provide support and security fixes for versions no longer officially supported by the communities.
Of course, this comes with a cost. Extended support for EKS is currently in preview and will not be charged for the time being, but it’s expected to change in early 2024. For MySQL, charges begin in March 2024, and for PostgreSQL, in April 2024.
This means that anyone using an old version of Kubernetes, MySQL, and PostgreSQL beyond the standard support period will automatically enter AWS’s extended support. This will result in an automatic increase in costs.
Actionable Tips:
- Stay updated: Prioritize updating Kubernetes, MySQL, and PostgreSQL to supported versions before the standard support period ends to avoid automatic charges.
- Evaluate cost-benefit: Analyze the value of extended support against the additional cost before opting in.
Thank you for reading.
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