Create spending plans, set alert thresholds for your spending, and track budget execution in real time. When actual or forecasted spending exceeds a threshold, the system automatically sends an alert to help you control your spending.
Overview
Budget Management is a cost optimization tool provided by Alibaba Cloud. It helps you effectively monitor your cloud spending and avoid unexpected charges by setting budgets for your organizations, departments, projects, or specific cloud services.
Track your actual spending against a budget plan. After you set a budget amount and alert rules, the system automatically sends alerts through email, and internal messages when an alert threshold is triggered. This keeps you informed of your budget's status.
You can also use Estimate-to-Actual Analysis to analyze trends in forecasted versus actual spending, allowing for dynamic adjustments.
Budget Management supports the following two budget types:
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cost budget: Primarily for costs generated by resources. You can set monetary budgets and corresponding alert thresholds for annual, quarterly, or monthly periods, based on dimensions such as accounts and products. When the actual or forecasted cost reaches the alert threshold, the system sends an alert.
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usage and coverage budget: Primarily for monitoring the utilization and coverage of savings plans and reserved instances. You can set utilization and coverage budgets and alert thresholds for annual, quarterly, or monthly periods, based on dimensions such as accounts, regions, and instances. When the utilization or coverage reaches the alert threshold, the system sends an alert.
When an alert threshold is triggered, the system sends an alert but does not restrict resource usage. Take action based on your business needs.
Create a budget
You must activate Budget Management before using it for the first time. Log on to the Expenses and Costs console. In the left-side navigation pane, select Budget Management, and then click Activate for Free. After activation, it may take up to 24 hours for data to become available, and the feature requires existing consumption data in your account to function correctly.
To create a budget, follow these steps: select a budget type, set a name, define the scope and period, configure threshold alerts, and save the budget.
Cost budget
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Log on to the Expenses and Costs console. On the Budget Management page, click Create Budget.
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Select a budget type: On the Create Budget page, select Cost budget, and then click Next.
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Set Budget: Configure the Basic Information and Budget Plan for your budget.
Configure the budget's Basic Information.
Parameter
Description
Budget Name
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Enter a descriptive name that reflects the budget's purpose and scope.
Enterprise/Organization/Account
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For an MA account that has enabled enterprise finance or a multi-account setup, you can create a budget for either the MA account or a member account.
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A member account under enterprise financial management can only create a budget for itself.
Budget Scope
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You can set the specific scope of the budget by dimensions such as cost center, owner account, region, product, product detail, and consumption type.
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For a single budget, you can click Add to create multiple scopes.
Cycle
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The period for aggregating budget data. Options are yearly, quarterly, or monthly.
Start and End Dates
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Based on the selected aggregation period, choose the start and end dates for the budget. We recommend a date range that does not exceed 24 aggregation periods.
Remarks
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Enter optional notes or details about the budget.
After you configure the basic information, a chart appears on the right, showing historical spending and a future spending forecast.
Configure the Budget Plan.
Parameter
Description
Budget Plan Type
Based on your aggregation period and date range, choose one of the following:
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Fixed Amount: Enter a fixed amount that applies to every aggregation period within the date range. The spending amount corresponds to the "Payable Amount" on your bill.
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Variable value: Set custom budget amounts for each aggregation period within the date range. The number of periods you can customize depends on the aggregation period type:
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Monthly aggregation period: Up to 12 aggregation periods.
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Quarterly aggregation period: Up to 4 aggregation periods.
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Yearly aggregation period: Up to 3 aggregation periods.
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Total Budget
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This value is automatically calculated based on the start and end dates, aggregation period, and budget plan type. You cannot edit this value.
After you confirm the budget information, click Next.
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Set Alert: Configure alert rules and notification methods for this budget. Click +Add Alerts to set up an alert. You can add up to five alert groups per budget.
Parameter
Description
Alert Object
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Actual cost (this period): Triggers an alert by comparing the actual cost of the current aggregation period with the budget for this period.
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Predicted Value of Current Cycle: Triggers an alert by comparing the forecasted cost of the current aggregation period with the budget for this period.
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Accumulative Predicted Value: Triggers an alert by comparing the forecasted cost from the budget start date to the current date with the total budget.
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Accumulated actual: Triggers an alert when the cumulative actual cost (from the start date to the present) exceeds the defined threshold.
Threshold Type
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Fixed Value: Triggers an alert when spending exceeds a specified amount.
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Percentage: Triggers an alert when spending exceeds a specified percentage of the budget.
Threshold
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Triggers an alert when the actual value exceeds this threshold.
Alert Remarks
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Enter optional notes or details about the alert.
Message Settings
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Set how alerts are received. You can configure recipients in the Message Center. Ensure that your selected recipients have verified email addresses to ensure they receive notifications.
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Confirm budget information: Review the budget details, amount, and alert settings. After verifying the details, click Submit to create the budget.
After you create a cost budget, the actual and forecasted values become available for viewing in two days (T+2).
For a cost budget, the system sends an alert only once, one day (T+1) after the threshold is exceeded.
Alerts are not sent if the budget's effective period has not yet begun. A newly added alert becomes effective at 12:00 (UTC+8) on the following day (T+1). For example, an alert configured at 09:00 on the 5th of the month (Beijing time) will become effective after 12:00 on the 6th.
Usage and coverage budget
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Log on to the Expenses and Costs console. On the Budget Management page, click Create Budget.
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Select a budget type: On the Create Budget page, select Usage or coverage budget, and then click Next.
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Set Budget: Configure the Basic Information and Budget Plan for your budget.
Configure the budget's Basic Information.
Parameter
Description
Budget Name
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Enter a descriptive name that reflects the budget's purpose and scope.
Enterprise/Organization/Account
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For an MA account that has enabled enterprise finance or a multi-account setup, you can create a budget for either the MA account or a member account.
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A member account under enterprise financial management can only create a budget for itself.
Deduct Resources
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Supports savings plans, reserved instances, and Storage Capacity Unit (SCU).
Usage or coverage budget
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Usage (%): Measures the efficiency of resource use. Higher utilization means the resource or instance is more fully utilized.
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Coverage: Measures the proportion of your pay-as-you-go usage covered by discounts. Higher coverage indicates greater cost savings.
Budget Scope
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You can set the budget scope by dimensions specific to the benefit type, such as region, resource type, or instance ID.
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For a single budget, you can click Add to create multiple scopes.
Cycle
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The period for aggregating budget data. Options are yearly, quarterly, or monthly.
Start and End Dates
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Based on the selected aggregation period, choose the start and end dates for the budget. We recommend a date range that does not exceed 24 aggregation periods.
Remarks
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Enter optional notes or details about the budget.
After you configure the basic information, a chart appears on the right, showing historical utilization.
Configure the Budget Plan.
Parameter
Description
Budget Plan Type
Based on your aggregation period and date range, choose one of the following:
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Budget in Percentage: Enter a fixed budget percentage that applies to every aggregation period.
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Variable value: Set custom budget percentages for each aggregation period within the date range. The number of periods you can customize depends on the aggregation period type:
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Monthly aggregation period: Up to 12 aggregation periods.
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Quarterly aggregation period: Up to 4 aggregation periods.
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Yearly aggregation period: Up to 3 aggregation periods.
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Total Budget
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This value is automatically calculated based on the start and end dates, aggregation period, and budget plan type. You cannot edit this value.
After you confirm the budget information, click Next.
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Set Alert: Configure alert rules and notification methods for this budget. Click +Add Alerts to set up an alert. You can add up to five alert groups per budget.
Parameter
Description
Threshold
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Triggers an alert when utilization or coverage falls below this threshold.
Alert Remarks
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Enter optional notes or details about the alert.
Message Settings
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Set how alerts are received. You can configure recipients in the Message Center.
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Confirm budget information: Review the budget details. After verifying the details, click Submit to create the budget.
After you create a usage and coverage budget, actual values become available for viewing in one day (T+1).
View budgets
View budget information
Log on to the Expenses and Costs console. On the Budget Management page, view all created budgets and their information, such as Type, Budget Name, Total Budget, Actual Total Amount, and Status:
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Type: Cost budget or Usage or coverage budget.
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Total Budget: The total budgeted cost, utilization, or coverage from the budget's start date to its end date.
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Actual Total Amount: The actual cost incurred or the actual utilization or coverage from the budget's start date to the current date.
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Estimated Total Amount: The forecasted spending, utilization, or coverage from the budget's start date to the current date.
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Actual Total Amount/Total Budget: Shows the budget's execution progress.
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Budget Scope: Click the View button to see the scope details associated with the budget, such as accounts, products, and regions.
For each budget, you can perform actions such as Edit, Copy, and Delete. You can also export the budget list.
Estimate-to-actual analysis
Select a budget and click Estimate-to-Actual Analysis in the Actions column to compare your budgeted and actual spending.
Forecasted values are derived from historical data and may differ from actual costs. These forecasts are for reference only.
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Estimate vs. actual trend: Shows the monthly trend of total actual and forecasted spending.
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Current period estimate vs. actual: Shows the total actual and forecasted amounts for the current period as a percentage of the current period's budget. Forecasting is not supported for usage and coverage budgets.
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Budget records: Displays the actual values, budgeted values, and the variance between them for each aggregation period within the budget's date range.
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Occurrence details:
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For a cost budget, click Actual Expenses for a single aggregation period to navigate to and view detailed consumption data for the corresponding date.
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For a usage and coverage budget for a savings plan, click Actual Expenses for a single aggregation period to navigate to and view detailed resource consumption data for the corresponding date.
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Alert settings: Click Set Alert in the upper-right corner of the page to modify the alert settings for the budget.
Legacy console
Log on to the Expenses and Costs console. In the left-side navigation pane, click to perform operations. The overall process is the same as described above.
Creating an effective budget
An effective budget provides a clear financial roadmap, enabling cost optimization without sacrificing business growth.
Step 1: Analyze historical spending
Review your cloud bills from the last 3 to 6 months to identify fixed and variable spending patterns:
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Stable costs: Identify recurring monthly expenses, such as long-running servers, reserved instances (RIs), and database services. These form your cost baseline.
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Variable fluctuations: Look for periodic patterns, like consumption peaks and troughs between day and night, to better predict future trends. Identify and exclude one-time cost spikes from the baseline, such as those from unexpected events, data migrations, or performance tests.
Step 2: Adjust for business growth
Communicate with relevant business and R&D teams to understand upcoming changes:
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New projects or features: Are new applications being deployed? Which new cloud services (such as AI/ML services) will be introduced? Estimate their initial costs.
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User or traffic growth: This implies a need to reserve more computing and bandwidth resources for higher traffic.
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Architectural changes: Are there plans for service migrations, technology stack upgrades, or architectural refactoring?
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Data volume growth: Is your monthly data storage requirement steadily increasing? This will affect your expected storage and backup costs.
Step 3: Refine the budget scope
Break down the overall budget into smaller sub-budgets with clear owners. Consider the following dimensions for segmentation:
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By project/product line: Set up a budget for each independent product or project.
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By team/department: Assign budgets to teams like 'Development Team', 'QA Testing Team', and 'Marketing Department'.
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By environment: Set separate budgets for 'Production', 'Testing', and 'Development' environments to prevent resource misuse in non-production environments.
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By cost center: For large enterprises, you can align budgets with internal financial cost centers.
Therefore, plan your account structure and cost center framework to align with your desired budget segmentation.
Step 4: Set amount and buffer
The cloud environment is flexible and uncertain. We recommend adding a 10% to 20% buffer to your historical average spending and estimated incremental costs. This buffer can cover unexpected performance issues, urgent scaling needs, or unforeseen usage growth.
The final formula is: Budget Amount = (Historical Spending Baseline + Future Incremental Costs) × (1 + Buffer Percentage)
Step 5: Configure alerts and feedback
Use alert rules to get advance notice of your budget's progress, enabling timely control:
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Set multi-level threshold alerts:
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50% (Informational/FYI): Send a reminder email to the project owner, informing them that the budget is halfway spent and the current status is normal.
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80% (Warning): Send a warning to the team to monitor the spending rate and check for anomalies.
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100% (Critical): Send a critical alert to the owner and the finance department, indicating that the budget is exhausted and requires an immediate review.
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We recommend using 'forecasted spending' alerts. When forecasted spending is predicted to reach 100% of the budget, you have ample time to adjust actual consumption.
Step 6: Review and iterate
Hold monthly or quarterly cost review meetings to analyze budget variances and their causes, identify any unconsidered cost items, and assess whether current business goals are being met. Dynamically adjust the next budget period based on the review's findings to achieve continuous optimization.