Cloud Compliance Cost Calculator

annual = controls × hours each × (1 − automation) × rate + audits × fee + tests × fee + log GB × rate × retention months × 12 + staff + tooling. Control effort scales with the control count but is reduced directly by evidence automation, because the recurring cost of compliance is collecting proof rather than implementing the control once. Log retention is modelled as steady-state storage: holding twelve months of logs means paying for twelve months of accumulated data every month, not once.

Compliance is usually funded as a project and then discovered to be a permanent run cost, and log retention alone can rival the workload it monitors. Framework control counts and retention mandates change with each revision, so confirm the current requirements with your auditor — this is a budgeting estimate, not legal or audit advice.

This calculator takes 15 inputs: Framework and control count, Hours to implement and evidence one control, Evidence collection automated, Blended engineering and GRC rate, External audit fee, Audits per year, Penetration test fee, Penetration tests per year, Compliance and posture tooling, Audit logs generated, Log retention rate, Mandated log retention, Dedicated compliance staff, Fully loaded cost per FTE, Annual cloud spend for context. The pre-filled defaults are a realistic starting point — replace them with figures from your own environment for a result you can act on.

Retention is cumulative. Generating 2 TB of logs a month with a twelve-month mandate means about 24 TB sitting in storage at steady state, and you pay for all of it every month. Tiering older months to archive or trimming what you ingest are the two levers that actually move the number.