Frequently Asked Questions

A: We are actively working on adding more services to the Amazon Pricing Calculator.

A: The Amazon Pricing Calculator currently only estimates service costs in CNY.

A: You can export your estimate to a csv file. We will soon launch capability to generate a link to share and/ or re access the estimate at a later time.

A: Prices and availability of Amazon Web Services, and certain service configuration options, vary per Region. Currently, you must select your Region first before you add and configure services to your estimate or to a group.

A: The Amazon Pricing Calculator enables customers to 1) add descriptions to individual services, 2) name their estimate and 3) name groups of services.

A: Groups are containers that you add services to in order to organize and build your estimate. You can organize your groups and services by cost-center, department, product architecture, etc.

A: The Amazon Pricing Calculator does not currently support bulk import data. This feature is coming soon.

A: The organization navigation is generated after you create your first group. If there are no groups, you will not see the Organization navigation.

A: The Amazon Pricing Calculator estimates service costs based on a normalized monthly time frame. The Calculator assumes there are 730 hours in a month ((365 days * 24 hours) / 12 months in a year), which may be less or more than the actual hours in the current billing period.

For example, if you use an On-Demand EC2 instance that costs 0.10 CNY an hour, you will see the following variances in pricing between your estimated cost and your actual monthly costs:

• Monthly cost estimated by the Amazon Pricing Calculator: 730 hours x 0.10 CNY = 73.00 CNY
• Actual cost in February of a non-leap year: 28 days x 24 hours x 0.10 CNY = 67.20 CNY
• Actual cost in February of a leap year: 29 days x 24 hours x 0.10 CNY = 69.60 CNY
• Actual cost in November: 30 days x 24 hours x 0.10 CNY = 72.00 CNY
• Actual cost in October: 31 days x 24 hours x 0.10 CNY = 74.40 CNY

If you use the same On-Demand EC2 instance for a year, your estimated and actual costs are the same:

• 12 month total cost estimated by the Amazon Pricing Calculator: 730 hours x 12 months x 0.10 CNY = 876.00 CNY
• Actual total hours a non-leap year: 8760 hours x 0.10 CNY = 876.00 CNY

Refer pricing assumptions.

A: In the estimate view, the totals bar shows the estimated total upfront, monthly and first 12 months costs for all services and groups of services in the estimate. If you select to view a particular group inside your estimate, the totals bar will update to show just the estimated total costs for the services and subgroups within the current group. 

A: For Amazon EC2, you can choose the Quick or Advanced route to estimation. The Quick estimate allows you to enter minimum requirements for the most common instance attributes, and the Calculator will return the lowest cost instance that meets your specifications. If you would like to filter, browse and compare instances by other, less common attributes, choose the Advanced estimate. The Advanced estimate allows you to view a complete table of instance options that can be filtered and sorted to your specifications.

A: In the Advanced estimate for Amazon EC2, select “Instance type” to expand this section. On the right side of the search field, select the gear icon to adjust your preferences for the EC2 instance table. A modal window will appear, and you can select which columns to view or hide in the table.

A: Add the total storage you want for multiple volumes and use the sum total for the volume you attach to Amazon EC2.