Amazon QuickSight Pricing

1. Who is a QuickSight “Reader”?

Readers in QuickSight can explore interactive dashboards, receive email reports, and download data.  QuickSight offers two reader pricing models: User pricing and Capacity pricing. Readers that are used for automatically or programmatically refreshing dashboards must choose capacity pricing. For user pricing, each reader must correspond to one individual only.

2. What is a Reader Session?

A Reader Session is an interval of time during which a QuickSight Reader can access dashboards and interact with data for a fixed, per-session charge. 

3. How long is a Reader Session?

Amazon QuickSight Reader sessions are of 30-minute duration each. Each session is charged at 2.02 CNY with maximum charges of 33.65 CNY per Reader in a month.

4. When does a Reader Session start and end?

A Reader Session starts with user-initiated action (e.g., login, dashboard load, page refresh, drill-down or filtering) and runs for next 30-minutes. Keeping Amazon QuickSight open in a background browser window/tab does not result in active sessions until the Reader initiates action on page. 

5. Will a Reader be logged out after a 30-minute session?

No, Reader sessions are transparent to the QuickSight Reader. Reader sessions will be automatically renewed in 30-minute intervals, and time out 30 minutes after start upon inactivity. Readers will only be logged out of QuickSight when their authentication expires, which is dependent on the authentication scheme in place.

6. Will a Reader be charged if QuickSight is open in a browser in a background tab?

No, Amazon QuickSight being open in a background tab will not result in usage charges. A session is only initiated when there is explicit Reader activity on the QuickSight web application. If QuickSight is moved to the background or minimized, there will be no additional sessions charged until the Reader interacts with QuickSight again.

7. What does the 33.65 CNY/month max on reader charges (when billed using per user model) mean?

Readers are charged at 2.02 CNY/session for the first 16 sessions in a calendar month. The 17th session in the month is charged at 1.33 CNY/session, after which there are no more charges for the month. The reader has unlimited access to QuickSight for 33.65 CNY charge accrued from the first 17 sessions of the month.

8. Do I have to pay for emailed reports from QuickSight?

QuickSight users that are Authors receive unlimited email reports as part of their monthly subscription. Readers (per-user pricing model) are billed 2.02 CNY (1 reader session) for each email report they receive, up to the monthly max charge of 33.65 CNY/reader. Each 2.02 CNY charge for an email report also provides the user with credit for a QuickSight session within the calendar month that can be used at any time they log into their account.

9. Are readers charged for email reports after they hit the 33.65 CNY monthly max charge for Readers?

No, all charges for a reader (per-user pricing model) are capped at 33.65 CNY/month. Readers will have unlimited access to both email reports and interactive dashboards after the monthly max charge of 33.65 CNY/reader.

10. How can I get started with Amazon QuickSight?

To get started, sign up to Amazon Quicksight, with 4 authors free in trial for 30 days.

11. How do I convert month to month billed authors to an annual commitment plan?

The annual commitment plan will automatically be applied to the month to month billed authors when the annual commitment plan billing period begins.

12. Who is a QuickSight “Admin”?

A QuickSight Admin is a user who can manage QuickSight users and account-level preferences, as well as purchase SPICE capacity and annual subscriptions for the account. Admins also have all QuickSight authoring capabilities. For billing purposes, QuickSight Authors and Admins are both recognized as "Authors".

1. What is session capacity pricing?

QuickSight’s session capacity pricing model allows purchase of sessions in bulk at discounted rates, for use across large user populations for embedded or BI use cases. With this model, the per-session costs decrease with commitments to larger usage.

2. When do I use capacity pricing?

Capacity pricing is beneficial when QuickSight dashboards need to be displayed to a large audience with dispersed usage, or in situations where the user population is expected to continuously grow. In both cases, the discounts on per-session pricing available with capacity pricing allow reduction in QuickSight costs over time. Session capacity pricing also allows use of QuickSight for programmatic access for display on large screens/monitors for consumption by multiple end users.

3. How long is a Session?

Amazon QuickSight Reader sessions are of 30-minute duration each. Each session capacity provides a specific number of sessions included, after which customers will be charged at the overage rate indicated for any additional sessions consumed for the duration of the capacity.

4. Will an end-user be logged out after a 30-minute session?

No, sessions are transparent to the end-user. Sessions will be renewed in 30-minute intervals, and time out 30 minutes after start upon inactivity. In case of embedded sessions, the host application will be responsible for renewing sessions based on setup.

1. What is a Report Unit?

Each Report Unit constitutes up to 100 pages (for paginated output types e.g. PDF, Word, PowerPoint) or 100 MB (for non-paginated output types e.g. Excel, CSV). Examples:

1.a Report X generated 550 pages, this would be counted as 6 reports [roundup(550/100)]

1.b Report Y generated 1 GB CSV file, this would be counted as 10 reports [roundup(1GB/100MB)] 

2. What constitutes a Unique Report?

Unique Report is defined as the number of Reports that are generated taking into account Row Level, Column Level Security and Dynamic Default Parameters. Example: if Reader 1 and Reader 2 share the same Row Level security only 1 Report will be generated for both Readers.

3. Is there a Free Tier?

No, there is not Free Tier option.

4. Is Reporting available for Enterprise Edition?

Yes, Reporting is available as an add-on to the Enterprise Edition.

5. What happens if I go over the committed number of Reports?

In a given month if the number of unique report units exceed the included number, then each additional report unit will be charged per unit.

6. Are my Author and Reader pricing affected by the Reporting add-on?

No, Author and Reader pricing are not affected.

7. What if my use case requires more report units?

Contact us for pricing options available for larger reporting needs.

8. What happens when I sign-up in the middle of the month?

Billing and the number of report units will be prorated starting with the hour you sign up to the end of the month.

9. What happens if I cancel my Reporting subscription before the end of my commitment period?

For Monthly plans the subscription will remain active until the end of the month and you are billed until then. For Annual plans the subscription will remain active until the end of the annual plan and you are billed until then.