AWS Cost Explorer basics - Mini Project: Build & Apply

AWS Cost Explorer basics

📖 Scenario: You are a cloud administrator for a small company. You want to understand how much your AWS services cost each month so you can manage your budget better.

🎯 Goal: Learn to set up and use AWS Cost Explorer to view monthly AWS costs by service.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a Cost Explorer query to get monthly cost data

Set a time period for the cost query

Group costs by AWS service

Configure the query to show results in USD

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

AWS Cost Explorer helps companies track and manage their cloud spending by showing detailed cost reports.

💼 Career

Cloud administrators and finance teams use Cost Explorer queries to optimize budgets and forecast expenses.

1

Create the initial Cost Explorer query parameters

Create a dictionary called cost_query with a key TimePeriod set to a dictionary with Start as "2024-01-01" and End as "2024-01-31".

AWS

# Create the cost_query dictionary with TimePeriod keys
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use nested dictionaries to set the time period with exact start and end dates.

2

Add grouping by AWS service

Add a key GroupBy to the cost_query dictionary. Set it to a list with one dictionary that has Type set to "DIMENSION" and Key set to "SERVICE".

AWS

cost_query = {
    "TimePeriod": {
        "Start": "2024-01-01",
        "End": "2024-01-31"
    }
}
# Add GroupBy key to cost_query
# Your code here

Need a hint?

GroupBy expects a list of dictionaries with Type and Key keys.

3

Add the metric to show unblended cost

Add a key Metrics to the cost_query dictionary. Set it to a list containing the string "UnblendedCost".

AWS

cost_query = {
    "TimePeriod": {
        "Start": "2024-01-01",
        "End": "2024-01-31"
    },
    "GroupBy": [
        {
            "Type": "DIMENSION",
            "Key": "SERVICE"
        }
    ]
}
# Add Metrics key with UnblendedCost
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Metrics is a list of strings specifying which cost metric to show.

4

Add the granularity setting

Add a key Granularity to the cost_query dictionary and set it to the string "MONTHLY".

AWS

cost_query = {
    "TimePeriod": {
        "Start": "2024-01-01",
        "End": "2024-01-31"
    },
    "GroupBy": [
        {
            "Type": "DIMENSION",
            "Key": "SERVICE"
        }
    ],
    "Metrics": ["UnblendedCost"]
}
# Add Granularity key with value 'MONTHLY'
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Granularity controls the time grouping of the cost data.