Auto Scaling is free of charge. However, you are charged for the resources or cloud services that are associated with Auto Scaling. This topic describes the billing details of the associated cloud services and resources. This topic also describes resource expiration and overdue payments.
Billing of associated cloud services and resources
You can associate the following cloud services and resources with Auto Scaling: Elastic Compute Service (ECS) instances, elastic container instances, Server Load Balancer (SLB) instances, ApsaraDB RDS instances, CloudMonitor, and Message Service (MNS). The following table describes the specific billable items and billing methods of the preceding cloud services and resources.
Cloud service or resource | Billable item | Billing method | References |
ECS instances | For ECS instances that are automatically created by Auto Scaling or you manually add to scaling groups, the billable items include instance types (computing resources), images, disks, public bandwidth, and snapshots. Important
| Subscription, Pay-as-you-go, and Preemptible Instance | Billing overview of ECS |
Elastic container instances | For elastic container instances that are automatically created by Auto Scaling or you manually add to scaling groups, the billable items include instance types (computing resources), image caches, data caches, and temporary storage space. Note You can use Alibaba Cloud network and storage services based on your business requirements. | Pay-as-you-go and Preemptible Instance | Billing overview of Elastic Container Instance |
SLB instances | You must create SLB instances before you can associate SLB instances with scaling groups. You must also pay for SLB instances if you associate SLB instances with scaling groups. The billable items may include instance usage, instance specifications, and public bandwidth. | Pay-as-you-go | Billing overview of SLB |
ApsaraDB RDS instances | You must create ApsaraDB RDS instances before you can associate ApsaraDB RDS instances with scaling groups. You must also pay for ApsaraDB RDS instances if you associate ApsaraDB RDS instances with scaling groups. The billable items may include instance types, storage capacity, and performance monitoring. | Subscription, Pay-as-you-go, and Serverless | Billing overview of ApsaraDB RDS |
Resource expiration and overdue payments
If the associated cloud resources expire or you have an overdue payment within your Alibaba Cloud account, the instances in scaling groups change from the previous status to another status. The following table describes solutions to resource expiration and overdue payments.
Regardless of whether the site is the China site (aliyun.com) or the international site (alibabacloud.com), Auto Scaling immediately removes instances that are stopped from scaling groups or releases the instances. Make sure that you have sufficient balance within your Alibaba Cloud account to ensure service availability.
Cloud service or resource | Billing method | Expiration or overdue payment | Solution |
ECS instances | Subscription |
Note ECS instances that are billed on a mixed basis refer to subscription ECS instances that provide pay-as-you-go services. By default, when an ECS instance that is billed on a mixed basis expires, the ECS instance also enters the Stopped state 15 days after expiration. If you still do not renew the ECS instance within the grace period, Auto Scaling removes the ECS instance that is in the Stopped state from your scaling group. | To ensure service availability, we recommend that you enable the auto-renewal feature. Before you enable the auto-renewal feature, make sure that your Alibaba Cloud account has sufficient balance. After you enable the auto-renewal feature, you can retain all resources. |
ECS instances | Pay-as-you-go |
| We recommend that you top up your Alibaba Cloud account and settle the outstanding bills at the earliest opportunity. This way, ECS instances can be recovered and provide services in scaling groups. For more information, see Start an instance. |
Elastic container instances | Pay-as-you-go | If you have an overdue payment within your Alibaba Cloud account, Auto Scaling immediately releases elastic container instances in scaling groups. For more information, see Overdue payments of Elastic Container Instance. | We recommend that you top up your Alibaba Cloud account and settle outstanding bills at the earliest opportunity. |
SLB instances | Subscription and Pay-as-you-go | SLB instances do not immediately stop providing services after they expire or are overdue. However, we recommend that you renew your SLB instances at the earliest opportunity to ensure service availability. For more information, see Overdue payments of SLB. | Note For pay-as-you-go instances, you need to only pay for the resources that you used based on the actual service time. To ensure that you have sufficient balance, top up your Alibaba Cloud account in the Alibaba Cloud Management Console. |
ApsaraDB RDS instances | Subscription and Pay-as-you-go | You can unlock or recreate an expired or overdue ApsaraDB RDS instance within the specified retention period. For more information, see Overdue payments of ApsaraDB RDS. |
FAQ about the billing rules of Auto Scaling
Auto Scaling is free of charge. However, you are charged for other Alibaba Cloud services or resources that you use in Auto Scaling. For more information about Auto Scaling billing issues, see Billing FAQ.