Create an AWS Budget Report and Alerts

1.0 Audience

  • Employees (Staff, Faculty)

 

2.0 Purpose 

The purpose of this knowledge base article is to guide staff and faculty through creating basic AWS budget reports using the AWS Billing console. This process helps monitor monthly spending and set alerts for budget thresholds.


This article applies to all operating systems and requires a modern web browser such as Google Chrome, Firefox, or Safari.


 

3.0 Instructions

Follow these steps to create a basic AWS budget report:

  1. Log in to your AWS account.
  2. Navigate to Billing → Budgets → select Create a budget.
    A screen shot of creation of an AWS budget with the wizard.

     
  3. Select Use a Template (simplified) and choose Monthly cost budget.
    A screen shot of creation of an AWS budget with the wizard.
     
  4. On the same screen:
    • Enter a Budget Name.
    • Specify the Budgeted Amount.
    • Add any email addresses for notifications.
    • Review the default alerts:
      • 85% of spend
      • 100% of spend
      • Forecasted spend
    • Click Create Budget.

A screen shot of creation of an AWS budget with the wizard.

 

  1. After creation, view all budgets in the Overview pane. You can create multiple budgets and set actions (e.g., stop EC2 instances) when thresholds are met.

A screen shot of AWS budget Overview

 

For more advanced options, see https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cost-management/latest/userguide/budgets-managing-costs.html and https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cost-management/latest/userguide/budgets-controls.html

 

4.0 Definitions 

  • AWS: Amazon Web Services, a cloud computing platform offering various services including compute, storage, and networking.
  • EC2: Elastic Compute Cloud, a service that provides scalable computing capacity in the AWS cloud.
  • Budget: A predefined spending limit set within AWS to monitor and control costs.

 

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