cloudcostdown.euAWS Billing Dashboard · Explained
AWS Billing Dashboard Explained: Understanding Your AWS Bill
The AWS Billing console has multiple sections that do different things. Most people only look at the Bills page - missing Cost Explorer, Budgets, and Cost Allocation Tags that are far more useful for understanding and controlling spend.
Key Billing Console Sections
Bills page
The Bills page shows your finalized monthly charges by service, expanded to show individual usage types. This is the most detailed view of what you actually paid.
How to use it
- Select the month in the top-right dropdown
- Expand each service row to see individual usage types (e.g., 'EC2 - Other' contains NAT Gateway, data transfer, Elastic IPs)
- Download as CSV for spreadsheet analysis
- Note: the Bills page shows billed charges - Cost Explorer shows accrued charges in real-time
Cost Explorer
Linked from Billing - this is the analytics tool. Filter by service, group by tag, view daily trends, and identify cost drivers before the month closes.
How to use it
- Use for real-time analysis during the month
- Group by 'Usage Type' to see specific billable items (not just service names)
- Filter by 'EC2 - Other' to see NAT Gateway, data transfer, and Elastic IP charges (hidden under EC2)
- Set date range to 'Last 3 months' for trend analysis
Budgets
Create spend thresholds with email alerts. Essential for catching runaway spend before the month ends.
How to use it
- Set a monthly budget for total account spend
- Set budget alerts at 80% and 100% of target
- Create separate budgets per environment (tag filter: env=prod)
- Link to SNS for Slack notifications via AWS Chatbot
Cost Allocation Tags
Activate tags here to make them appear as filterable dimensions in Cost Explorer. Without activation, tags are invisible to billing analytics.
How to use it
- Billing console → Cost Allocation Tags → User-defined
- Search for your tag keys and click Activate
- Wait 24 hours - tags appear in Cost Explorer the next day
- Historical data is NOT backfilled - only future usage shows tagged data
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does 'EC2 - Other' show on my bill?
'EC2 - Other' is a catch-all for EC2-adjacent charges that aren't instance compute: NAT Gateway hourly and data processing fees, Elastic IP addresses, inter-AZ data transfer, and snapshots. To see the breakdown, open Cost Explorer → Group by Usage Type → filter by EC2 usage types. NAT Gateway charges often appear as 'USE1-NatGateway-Bytes' or similar.
What is the difference between the Billing dashboard and Cost Explorer?
The Billing dashboard (console.aws.amazon.com/billing) shows finalized charges for closed months and an estimate for the current month. Cost Explorer (console.aws.amazon.com/cost-management/home#/cost-explorer) is an analytics tool for analyzing spend patterns, filtering, grouping by tags, and seeing daily/hourly breakdowns in real-time.
Why is my bill different from what Cost Explorer shows?
Several reasons: Cost Explorer shows accrued charges which may not yet be finalized (pricing adjustments, Savings Plans credits applied at month-end). Reserved Instance and Savings Plans discounts are applied at month-end billing. Marketplace charges may appear separately. The Bills page is always the authoritative final number.
How do I see which account is spending the most in an AWS Organization?
Billing console → Bills → expand the service row → the charges are broken down by linked account. In Cost Explorer, group by Linked Account to see spend per account. The management account pays consolidated bills and can see spending across all accounts.
What are 'Support' charges on my bill?
Your AWS Support plan charge. Business support charges a percentage of your monthly bill (10% for first $10K, 7% for next $70K, etc.) with a $100 minimum. Enterprise starts at $15,000/month. If you see unexpected support charges, check your current support plan in the AWS Support console.