Snapshot Cost Calculator
Price EBS snapshots as the incremental blocks they really are, and compare that with full-size Snapshot Archive copies.
About Snapshot Cost Calculator
Only the first EBS snapshot of a volume is anything like full size; every later one stores just the blocks that changed, and all of them share the unchanged blocks, so thirty daily snapshots cost far less than thirty copies. Snapshot Archive inverts that: it is a much cheaper per-GB rate but stores a full, independent copy with a 90-day minimum, so it only wins for snapshots you keep for a long time and rarely restore. All rates are user-supplied list prices to confirm on the AWS EBS pricing page for your region. Budgets built on volume size times snapshot count routinely overstate snapshot spend by an order of magnitude, and the same misunderstanding is why teams archive snapshots that were cheaper left incremental.
Formula
Snapshot Cost
standard snapshot GiB = used GiB + (snapshots − 1) x changed GiB; archive GiB = archived snapshots x used GiB, because archived copies are full.
- used GiB
- Written blocks on the volume, the only blocks a snapshot copies
- changed GiB
- Blocks modified between consecutive snapshots
Worked example
With the default values below, Snapshot Cost Calculator returns Monthly Snapshot Cost of $54.90. Change any input above and every figure here is recalculated in your browser.
Inputs used
- Provisioned volume sizeminimum 1 GiB
- 500 GiB
- Share of the volume actually writtenaccepts 0–100 %
- 60 %
- Blocks changed between snapshotsaccepts 0–100 %
- 4 %
- Standard snapshots retainedminimum 0 snapshots
- 30 snapshots
- Standard snapshot priceminimum 0 USD per GB-month
- 0.05 USD per GB-month
- Snapshots moved to Snapshot Archiveminimum 0 snapshots
- 6 snapshots
- Snapshot Archive priceminimum 0 USD per GB-month
- 0.0125 USD per GB-month
Results
- Monthly Snapshot Cost
- $54.90
- Standard Snapshot Data Stored
- 648.0 GiB
- Standard Snapshot Cost
- $32.40
- Snapshot Archive Cost
- $22.50
- Cost If Every Snapshot Were Full Size
- $750.00
- Amount a Full-size Estimate Overstates
- $717.60
Step by step
- 1Values used
- 2Snapshot Cost
- 3Monthly Snapshot Cost= 54.90
- 4Standard Snapshot Data Stored= 648.0 GiB
- 5Standard Snapshot Cost= 32.40
- 6Snapshot Archive Cost= 22.50
- 7Cost If Every Snapshot Were Full Size= 750.00
- 8Amount a Full-size Estimate Overstates= 717.60
Assumptions and limits
- The result is derived only from the 7 inputs listed above. Anything not among them is not part of the calculation.
- In particular, this calculator does not take inflation, tax, fees or charges or compounding frequency into account.
- Figures are rounded for display to 2 decimal places, so totals built from several rounded parts can differ slightly from the unrounded arithmetic.
How these calculators are built and tested is described on the Methodology page. If a figure looks wrong, please report it.
Frequently Asked Questions
How is Snapshot Cost calculated?
standard snapshot GiB = used GiB + (snapshots − 1) x changed GiB; archive GiB = archived snapshots x used GiB, because archived copies are full. Only the first EBS snapshot of a volume is anything like full size; every later one stores just the blocks that changed, and all of them share the unchanged blocks, so thirty daily snapshots cost far less than thirty copies. Snapshot Archive inverts that: it is a much cheaper per-GB rate but stores a full, independent copy with a 90-day minimum, so it only wins for snapshots you keep for a long time and rarely restore. All rates are user-supplied list prices to confirm on the AWS EBS pricing page for your region.
Why does Snapshot Cost matter?
Budgets built on volume size times snapshot count routinely overstate snapshot spend by an order of magnitude, and the same misunderstanding is why teams archive snapshots that were cheaper left incremental.
What values do I need to enter?
This calculator takes 7 inputs: Provisioned volume size, Share of the volume actually written, Blocks changed between snapshots, Standard snapshots retained, Standard snapshot price, Snapshots moved to Snapshot Archive, Snapshot Archive price. The pre-filled defaults are a realistic starting point — replace them with figures from your own environment for a result you can act on.
Does deleting a snapshot free its full size?
No. Deleting a snapshot only frees blocks no remaining snapshot references, so removing one snapshot from the middle of a chain often reclaims almost nothing.