View data across all of your CSP services with the Bill Analysis dashboard and reports. This page shows all services, whether currently used or not, to provide an overall view of your cloud provider cost.
This report can include data from multiple accounts if consolidated billing has been set up and configured.
Bill Analysis helps you to do the following:
Each time you access the Bill Analysis page, Cloud Cost Management (CCM) pulls the latest available data from Cost Explorer in AWS or from Insights in Azure. This allows you to view the same data you can see on your service provider's bill, but you can group and filter the data by Attributes, Tags, Time Period (Day/Week/Month), and other settings to get a better understanding of the billing details.
Period Comparison View allows you to compare cloud spend by. For example, you can select the Group Data By option and compare the spend of any grouping against various time periods.
Stacked View allows you to analyze cost in two dimensions by using the Stack By option. This is important as it allows you to view this data in a unique way. For example, you could see a breakdown of Services by Tag1 for Chargeback.
Hover over the chart to see details about each item in the chart. There is a table below the chart that displays the same information as the chart, but in tabular format.
Note
Sometimes the settings for a report do not apply to any resources in your environment. When that happens, the report will be empty, displaying no results. If the report is set up for email, a report might not be sent.
Related Topics
Bill Analysis delivers complete visibility into multi-cloud costs and billings. You can generate report data for your Azure or AWS integrations across all of your consolidated or linked accounts
From here, you can view reports about the costs of cloud accounts compared to prior periods and broken down by a wide choice of factors, such as service, location, region, operating system, platform, and numerous other options.
Some things you can do with Bill Analysis reports:
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Identify changes in your cloud environment
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Track short and long-term spending trends with the period comparison view
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Compare the cost of a certain service in relation to your whole services portfolio, using the stacked view
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Filter by services, attributes, and tags
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Save your configured reports for future use
From the Bill Analysis page you can perform the following actions:
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Create, edit, and save Bill Analysis report settings
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View report data in graphical or tabular format
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Download report data in a
.xlsxspreadsheet -
Print the chart or download it in a variety of format
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Edit and save report filters
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Schedule CSO reports for emailing
Tip
Hover over any item in the chart to see detailed information. Click the items in the legend below the chart to filter those items in or out of the chart.
When configuring reports with AWS data, you have an option to show costs as amortized, blended, or unblended.
If you have consolidated multiple AWS accounts into a single billing account and have reserved instances that are shared across those accounts, you can view your costs on an unblended or blended basis.
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Amortized
Overview: A cost metric that represents the effective daily rate of upfront, prepaid fees, combined with monthly reservation fees, including applied discount rates, and spread across the billing period.
Additional info:
The Amortized view distributes any upfront fees and monthly installments evenly across the reservation period. Cost is presented on an accrual basis, as transactions are displayed as they occur, whether paid or not. This is useful because when you purchase EC2 reservations, your costs are recorded at the time they are charged. They’ll appear as a single charge on that day, distorting the scale of the cost axis. Because other EC2 usage costs can be so much lower than the reservation fees, they almost disappear from the chart and you won’t be able to see spending trends. To solve this problem, use the Amortized view.
Calculation: [prepaid fees] + [reservations] ÷ [days in billing period]
When to use: To see more accurate spending trends that include EC2 usage costs and reservation fees.
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Unblended
Overview: This cost metric displays the amount charged at the time of usage. (This is the default setting.)
Additional info: Cost is presented on a cash basis, reflecting usage on the day it is charged. When grouped by charge type, unblended costs separate discounts into their own line items.
Calculation: For each AWS resource, [applicable rates] x [usage]
When to use: To view the amount of each discount received.
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Blended
Overview: This cost metric is based on the average rate for each instance type for all member accounts of an organization.
Additional info: Blended costs are the averaged rates of the reserved and on-demand instances that are used by member accounts that are consolidated under a single billing account. The blended view recognizes relative usage of reserved instances. Accounts that make more use of reserved instances will be allocated a higher proportion of those overall costs. Note that if you only have one account, if you don’t have consolidated billing set up, or if you don’t use a reserved instance, then the blended and unblended costs will be the same and reflect the simple usage costs.
Calculation: [combined rate for each service] x [an account's use of the service]
When to use: To have a consolidated view of member accounts in an AWS parent organization.
For more information, see the AWS documentation and AWS blog.
You can create, edit, or email reports that contain Bill Analysis data. Cloud Cost Management (CCM) includes Default reports that you cannot modify or delete. However, you can make changes to the Settings for a Default report and save the changes with a new name. Viewing reports requires only a read-only role.
You can also use policies to add constraints to the reports. Creating policies requires an administrator role.
About This Task
To complete this task, you must select a report filter and then edit and save the report settings.
Prerequisites
You should be familiar with the use of tags and attributes in CCM before creating or editing reports. See Filtering in Virtana Platform and Filtering and Grouping Options for more information.
Note
Virtana Platform reports display currency only in US dollars (USD}. To accurately reflect costs, ensure your data sources have the currency display set to US dollars in the AWS or Azure portal. For Azure, see Set the Currency Option in Azure to USD.
Steps
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In the CCM module, navigate to Bill Analysis.
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Select a report Filter that is associated with the data source you want.
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Select the Data Source.
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Select the report Settings to modify and click
to edit the report. -
Under Report Format, select the following:
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Select Period Comparison or Stacked View format.
Period Comparison displays a side-by-side color-coded breakdown of spend for a single user-selected category.
Stacked View displays a color-coded stacked breakdown of spend based on two categories that you select.
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Select from the Group Data By options.
If you select Stacked View for the format, two fields display, "Group Data by" and "then by".
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Select Sort Data By options.
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Limit the number of groups in the chart with a range from Top 5 to Top 1000 or Show All.
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Under Additional Data Filtering, select any services you want to include in the output.
You can select multiple services.
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Under Options, select a Utilization Metric and Metric Statistic.
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Select any desired Matching Conditions.
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Apply the configuration to view the report.
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Click the time range selector to view data for different time periods.
For AWS data sources, the Latest 12 Months and Year to date time range options are disabled, as they would not provide usable data.
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Other actions you can perform from this page:
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To undo changes to Settings, click
.This icon only displays when there are unsaved changes to Settings. After the changes are saved, you cannot revert the changes.
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Save the report settings.
You can select the option to update the current report or save it with a new name. You cannot undo changes to settings after changes are saved.
Tip
Give reports unique descriptive names so you can easily distinguish them as you add more reports. Establishing a naming convention can be helpful.
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Email a report or schedule a report for email by clicking
in the upper right of the page.
Note
Sometimes the settings for a report do not apply to any resources in your environment. When that happens, the report will be empty, displaying no results. If the report is set up for email, a report might not be sent.
Related Topics
The Bill Analysis dashboard in Cloud Cost Management (CCM) (formerly Optimize) simplifies tracking and budgeting your cloud spend. This dashboard reads the cost data from your CSP account and breaks it down by cost allocation tags, services, and metadata.
To help familiarize you with the capabilities and options provided by the Bill Analysis dashboard, we have developed several example scenarios for common bill analysis reports.
About the AWS Scenarios
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These scenarios show you how to use the Bill Analysis dashboard using different features to obtain various results.
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It is best to follow the scenarios in order, as each one builds upon the previous scenario.
Prerequisites
A common action in your cloud account is likely to be creating monthly total cost reports for management.
Let’s say you want to explore a breakdown of your bill across resource locations for the past month (30 days). How would you do that? Watch the video or read the instructions to learn how.
Prerequisites
Report filters, if being used, must have already been created. See Create or Edit Report Filters.
Steps
Watch the video or read the steps below. (Note that the Optimize module is now known as Cloud Cost Management (CCM).)
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Log in to Virtana Platform, access the CCM module, and navigate to Bill Analysis.
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Select a report Filter.
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Select a Data Source.
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Select the report Settings to modify and click
to edit the report. -
Under Report Format, select the following:
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Select Stacked View.
Stacked View displays a color-coded stacked breakdown of spend based on two categories that you select.
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Select Group Data by AZ and then by Service.
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For Sort Data By, select Total Cost and Descending.
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Limit the number of groups in the chart to Top 10.
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Under Additional Data Filtering, clear any selected items.
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Under Options, select Unblended.
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Under Matching Conditions, delete any conditions.
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Apply the configuration to view the report.
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Click the time range selector and choose
. -
Hover over or click any parameter (for example, time range) in the legend below the chart to include or exclude the data associated with that parameter.
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Click Save and select Save Report Setting as...
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Give your report a unique descriptive name and click Save.
For example, AZ x Services total cost.
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Click the report scheduler icon
and then click Add Scheduled Report.Provide an email address, for an individual, a team, etc.
Email updates can be turned on or off at any time by editing the saved report schedule.
Tip
Make a note of the names of the report filter, data source, and saved report you created. You will use them in future scenarios.
Practice
EC2 - Other is a large spending category for many AWS users. Based on what we did above, create a report that breaks that spending down more.
Configuration Settings
Apply the following:
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Time Range: Latest 30 Days
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Report Format: Stacked View
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Group Data By: Usage Type and then by Service.
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Limit number of groups...: Top 10
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Additional Data Filtering: Service > EC2 - Other
Result
You should see a breakdown of EC2 - Other spend by Usage Type.
You can contextualize this data even further by using the Period Comparison report format. Simply change the report format to Period Comparison and retain the other settings. The report should now indicate whether your spending is increasing or decreasing over time across different dimensions.
It’s helpful to save various reports that slice your billing data using different dimensions and levels of granularity so that you can discover cost trends, cost deltas, and highlight saving success over time.
Save this report too, as it’s a great basis for exploring cost deltas.
The Bill Analysis dashboard in Cloud Cost Management (CCM) (formerly Optimize) simplifies tracking and budgeting your cloud spend. This dashboard reads the cost data from your CSP account and breaks it down by cost allocation tags, services, and metadata.
To help familiarize you with the capabilities and options provided by the Bill Analysis dashboard, we have developed several example scenarios for common bill analysis reports.
About the Azure Scenarios
-
These scenarios show you how to use the Bill Analysis dashboard using different features to obtain various results.
-
It is best to follow the scenarios in order, as each one builds upon the previous scenario.
Prerequisites
A common action in your cloud account is likely to be creating monthly total cost reports for management.
Let’s say you want to explore a breakdown of your bill across resource locations for the past month (30 days). How would you do that?
Prerequisites
Report filters, if being used, must have already been created. See Create or Edit Report Filters.
-
Log in to Virtana Platform, access the CCM module, and navigate to Bill Analysis.
-
Select a report Filter.
-
Select a Data Source.
-
Select the report Settings to modify and click
to edit the report. -
Under Report Format, select the following:
-
Select Stacked View.
Stacked View allows you to see a color-coded breakdown of spend based on two categories that you select.
-
In the Group Data By dropdown, select Location and then by Service Tier.
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For Sort Data By, select Total Cost and Ascending.
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Limit the number of groups in the chart to Top 10.
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Under Additional Data Filtering, clear any selected items.
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Under Options, select Unblended.
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Under Matching Conditions, delete any conditions.
-
-
Apply the configuration to view the report.
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Click the time range selector and choose
. -
Hover over the chart to see details about each item.
-
Hover over or click any parameter (for example, time range) in the legend below the chart to include or exclude the data associated with that parameter.
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Click Save and select Save Report Setting as...
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Give your report a unique descriptive name and click Save.
For example, Location x Service Tier total cost.
Tip
Note that you can modify a report and save it using Save > Update Selected Report Settings.
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Click the report scheduler icon
and then click Add Scheduled Report.Provide an email address, for an individual, a team, etc.
Email updates can be turned on or off at any time by editing the saved report schedule.
Practice
Storage is one of the spending categories that you may wish to take a closer look at. Let’s take what you learned from the above and create a report that breaks down that spend category in more detail.
Configuration Settings
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Time Range: Latest 30 Days
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Format: Period Comparison
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Group Data By: Product
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Additional Data Filtering > Services: storage
Your Configuration modal should look like this:
Result
Now you can see a breakdown of Storage spend by Product.
You can contextualize this data even further by using Period Comparisons. Using a Period Comparison allows you to see whether your spending is increasing or decreasing over time across different dimensions. Below is a Period Comparison for the report you just made.
It’s helpful to save various reports that slice your billing data using different dimensions and levels of granularity so that you can discover cost trends, cost deltas, and highlight saving success over time.
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