WHAT WE WATCH

Seven areas. Each one watched closely.

leancosts watches seven areas where cloud cost tends to leak. Each has its own rules and runs day and night. When it finds something, it prepares a change with the evidence attached — you approve or reject, and it learns from your call.

1. Servers · compute

   Restless about idle servers, oversized plans — and the ones running starved. Right-sizes both ways and checks 6 periods of spend before claiming anything.

   • Right-sizes only after spend holds steady
   • Shuts down what sits idle for 3+ periods
   • Drops a plan a tier when capacity is spare
   • Flags a size-up for what runs starved, before it degrades

2. Storage

   Opens every drawer. Counts file by file. Finds the orphaned disk still attached to a server no one remembers shutting down in 2024.

   • Moves cold data to a cheaper tier
   • Disks unused for 30+ days
   • Copy type (local or geo) by actual usage

3. Databases · licensing

   Reads database usage like poetry. When an instance asks for a smaller plan, it already has the savings from the license you own.

   • Switches to the cheaper plan
   • Uses licenses you already pay for
   • Moves to a managed service when it pays off

4. Network

   Chases the traffic. Idle gateways, forgotten rules, cross-region transfer no one authorized — finds them all.

   • Gateway with no traffic for 30+ days
   • Load balancer with nothing behind it
   • Cross-region transfer without justification

5. Commitments · reservations

   Calculates your reservation coverage against actual usage, simulates 1 and 3 years, and never buys a commitment for a workload that hasn't settled.

   • Simulates coverage with 12 months of history
   • Break-even by workload and by region
   • Warns before a reservation expires

6. Logs · monitoring

   Knows log retention is the silent killer. Tunes collection, splits by area, and kills rules no one has looked at in months.

   • Trims retention on stagnant tables
   • Collects only the sample needed
   • Splits by area instead of all-in-one

7. Backups

   Reads retention policy like a vault inventory. When a backup keeps 35 days with no restore for over a month, it proposes shrinking to the free window — reversible with one click.

   • Backup beyond the included window, no recent restore
   • Retention schedule above the agreed SLA
   • Pricing from the official catalog