Terraform Cost Optimization — Stop Overpaying for Cloud Infrastructure
Your Terraform code provisions your infrastructure, which means it directly controls your cloud bill. Over-provisioned instances, missing auto-scaling, forgotten resources, and inefficient architectures add up fast. We audit your Terraform codebase for cost optimization opportunities, implement the changes, and set up ongoing cost monitoring so you know immediately when spending deviates from expectations.
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How Terraform Controls Your Cloud Bill
Every resource block in your Terraform code has a cost. An aws_instance with instance_type = "m5.xlarge" costs $140/month. Change it to m7g.large" (Graviton, smaller, often sufficient) and it is $59/month. Multiply this by 20 instances and you save $1,600/month from a one-line change. This is the power and the risk of IaC — your code is your bill.
The most common cost waste we find in Terraform codebases: instances sized for peak load that rarely reaches 30% utilization, RDS instances on db.r5.2xlarge when db.t3.large would suffice, NAT Gateways in every AZ when one is enough for non-production environments, EBS volumes provisioned with high IOPS that are not needed, and Elastic IPs attached to stopped instances.
Terraform makes these optimizations safe because every change goes through plan first. You see exactly what will change, review the impact, and apply with confidence. No manual console clicking where you might accidentally change the wrong instance.
Cost Optimization Strategies We Implement
Right-sizing: We analyze CloudWatch metrics (CPU, memory, network, disk I/O) for every provisioned resource and recommend right-sized instance types. We update the Terraform code, run a plan to confirm the change, and apply during a maintenance window. For RDS, we also evaluate whether Aurora Serverless v2 would be more cost-effective for variable workloads.
Spot and Savings Plans: For workloads that tolerate interruption (CI runners, batch processing, non-critical workers), we configure spot instances or spot fleets in Terraform with fallback to on-demand. For stable workloads, we help you purchase Savings Plans or Reserved Instances based on your actual Terraform-provisioned capacity.
Auto-scaling: We add auto-scaling policies to ECS services, EKS node groups, and EC2 ASGs based on relevant metrics (CPU, request count, queue depth). Resources scale down during low-traffic periods instead of running at peak capacity 24/7. For non-production environments, we implement scheduled scaling that shuts down resources outside business hours.
Infracost Integration: We add Infracost to your Terraform CI/CD pipeline so every PR shows the monthly cost impact of the proposed change. Developers see "this change adds $47/month" or "this change saves $200/month" before merging. Cost awareness becomes part of the development workflow, not a surprise on the monthly bill.
Resource cleanup: We identify and remove orphaned resources — unattached EBS volumes, unused Elastic IPs, old snapshots, forgotten load balancers — both in Terraform state and in the cloud account. These resources cost money every month for no value.
What You Get
A cost-optimized Terraform codebase with ongoing cost visibility:
- Right-sized resources — instance types matched to actual utilization data
- Auto-scaling — scale-to-zero for non-production, metric-based scaling for production
- Spot integration — spot instances for suitable workloads with on-demand fallback
- Infracost in CI — cost impact on every PR, visible before merge
- Resource cleanup — orphaned and unused resources identified and removed
- Cost alerts — AWS Budgets or equivalent configured with Terraform, alerting on anomalies
- Savings report — documented before/after costs with projected annual savings
Why Anubiz Engineering
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