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AWS Cost Reduction: From $22,000 to $6,300 with Practical Strategies

May 20, 2025

In the world of cloud computing, one of the biggest challenges for companies is keeping costs under control without sacrificing performance. In this article, I share the specific strategies we’ve implemented to reduce our AWS infrastructure costs from $22,219 to $6,334 per month, nearly 70% in savings.

The Starting Point: A Historical High of $22,219

In January 2023, our AWS bill reached its historical high: $22,219.16. Our infrastructure had grown organically over time, resulting in a very high monthly bill that didn’t necessarily correspond to our actual needs.

The main problem? Lack of cost visibility and strategy. We had resources we were paying for without using, oversized instances, and an architecture that hadn’t been reviewed with a cost focus.

Optimization Strategies Implemented

After a comprehensive analysis of our infrastructure, we implemented a series of strategies that have significantly reduced our monthly bill.

1. Databases: RDS Reserved Instances

One of the most immediate improvements was migrating our RDS instances to the reserved instance model.

Before: On-Demand Instances

After: Reserved Instances (1 year, Standard, No Upfront)

This change was immediate with no performance impact, simply by committing to using the same instance size for one year.

2. DynamoDB: Provisioned Capacity Review

Many DynamoDB tables had provisioned read/write units that were no longer being used.

Actions taken:

Result: Significant savings by eliminating payment for unused capacity.

3. EC2 and EKS: Spot Instances and Saving Plans

For computational processes, we implemented a mixed strategy:

Spot Instances

For non-critical processes that tolerate interruptions, such as:

Savings: Up to 70-90% compared to On-Demand instances

Saving Plans

For the vast majority of instances running 24x7 requiring guaranteed availability:

Savings: Average of 50-60% compared to On-Demand

Graviton Instances

Migration to ARM-based instances (Graviton) whenever possible:

Savings: Additional 20-30% compared to equivalent x86 instances

4. Orphaned Resources: Infrastructure Cleanup

One of the most surprising discoveries was the amount of resources we were paying for without using:

Resources removed:

Cleanup process:

  1. Automation with orphaned resource detection scripts
  2. Manual review of each detected resource
  3. Safe deletion with retention policies

Savings: Hundreds of dollars monthly on resources no one was using.

5. Networking: VPC and Public IP Optimization

The network architecture also had significant hidden costs:

VPC Peering:

Public IP Reduction:

Result: Significant reduction in network costs.

6. Infrastructure as Code: Terraform Management

A fundamental change was managing all infrastructure and environments with Terraform:

Benefits:

Impact: Continuous improvement in infrastructure efficiency.

Global Results

Cost evolution

After implementing all these strategies progressively during 2023 and 2024, the results have been very significant:

Economic Impact

Operational Improvement

Beyond economic savings, we’ve achieved significant improvements:

  1. Visibility: Exact knowledge of what resources we have and what they’re for
  2. Control: Ability to predict and control the monthly bill
  3. Efficiency: Fewer resources, same (or better) processing capacity
  4. Cost culture: Team awareness of the impact of technical decisions on costs

Lessons Learned

1. Consistency is Key

Cost optimization is not a one-time project but a continuous process. Platform needs change and infrastructure must adapt.

2. Automate Detection

Orphaned resource detection scripts are essential. Humanly, it’s impossible to maintain control without automation.

3. Review Periodically

We established quarterly reviews of:

This allowed us to go from $22,219 in January 2023 to $12,977 in December 2023, and reach the historical low of $6,334 in April 2025.

4. Infrastructure as Code is Mandatory

You can’t optimize what you don’t know. Terraform (or equivalent IaC) is essential to maintain control.

5. Not All Savings Are Worth It

You must evaluate implementation cost vs resulting savings. Some optimizations require a lot of effort for minimal savings.

Conclusion

AWS cost reduction is not magic, but a combination of visibility, strategy, and consistency. The techniques described in this article - reserved instances, spot instances, Graviton, orphaned resource cleanup, network optimization, and infrastructure as code - have allowed us to reduce our bill by nearly 70%, from $22,219 to $6,334 monthly.

The journey hasn’t been linear: we went from $22,219 in January 2023 to $12,977 in December 2023, and reached the historical low of $6,334 in April 2025. Each optimization contributed its grain of sand, and the sum of all of them has made possible such a significant reduction.

If your AWS infrastructure has grown without a clear cost strategy, I encourage you to start with analysis: what you have, what you actually use, and what you can optimize. The results can be surprising, as demonstrated by our nearly $200,000 in annual savings.