AWS Cost and Usage Report
AWS Cost and Usage Report is an Amazon Web Services service that provides the most detailed set of AWS cost and usage data available, including metadata about AWS resources, pricing, Reserved Instances, and Savings Plans.
Key points
- Distinct from AWS Cost Explorer, which visualizes and forecasts spend graphically — CUR is the underlying raw, line-item data export, not a dashboard.
- Delivers report files to an Amazon S3 bucket, updating them at least once a day and up to three times a day.
- Reports can be downloaded directly from the Amazon S3 console for viewing.
- For deeper analysis, reports can be queried with Amazon Athena or loaded into Amazon Redshift or Amazon QuickSight.
- Access is controlled through IAM permissions or IAM roles.
- If a member account in an AWS Organization owns or creates a report, it can only access billing data covering the period it has been a member of the organization.
- A master account can block member accounts from setting up a Cost and Usage Report using a Service Control Policy (SCP).
- Breaks down cloud costs by company-defined tags and by hour, day, and month.
- AWS now recommends setting up Cost and Usage Report 2.0 via AWS Data Exports rather than the legacy standalone CUR described above; AWS documentation calls Data Exports “the new and recommended way to receive your detailed cost and usage data.” The legacy CUR setup still works and remains supported for existing workflows, and Amazon S3 remains the destination for both.