Intelligent Tiering experience report

[arianvp]

We've enabled #728 on May 14. I am looking if it's actually saving us money.

Looking at the daily cost data currently it seems that we're actually paying more than before.

We traded $215 of infrequent access cost for $380 of Intelligent tiering cost.

We should investigate why that is as it's not what I expected

Usage type	TimedStorage-INT-FA-ByteHrs($)	DataTransfer-Out-Bytes($)	TimedStorage-ByteHrs($)	TimedStorage-SIA-ByteHrs($)	Requests-Tier4($)	Requests-Tier2($)	StorageAnalytics-ObjCount($)	Monitoring-Automation-INT($)	Inventory-ObjectsListed($)	EarlyDelete-SIA($)	Requests-Tier1($)	Retrieval-SIA($)	Requests-INT-Tier2($)	Requests-SIA-Tier2($)	Total costs($)
Usage type total	4226.8048462018	2857.3985549263	930.4473028613	647.3122396221	623.88603	456.7779304	61.6184525257	55.1711418548	36.0297616875	32.6479389031	23.072555	15.0415632741	3.6567556	2.25709	9972.1221638147
2026-05-13		282.668033647	68.172998192	215.1720639255	0.2553	49.4088764	4.3932964774		2.7668085725		1.4011	6.5549013326		0.933031	631.726409618
2026-05-14		199.8469526819	68.2129491504	215.2569305713	9.99332	31.4271568	4.394623529		2.7675312425		1.33405	5.1063777351	0.0019168	0.795555	539.1373635702
2026-05-15	18.5687077367	215.1188751934	68.5190910252	205.099040778	496.9198	28.0584316	4.3957322258	0.238928871	2.7681656025	0.5471449221	1.344955	3.3508606661	0.1131216	0.522885	1045.5657402908
2026-05-16	374.5783740064	217.4085524168	68.4058795095	11.7842043473	114.68242	18.880922	4.3967231968	4.7299193548	2.7688354125	26.4481341438	1.629875	0.0294235403	0.2689552	0.005619	846.0178371982
2026-05-17	396.386712971	183.0103414922	67.0378078921		0.19286	19.4346388	4.3977612677	5.0121943548	2.7696781925	5.6526598372	1.695755		0.2989496		685.8893594785
2026-05-18	396.1828515666	230.0545423983	65.5130706965		0.22224	34.751572	4.399073129	5.0138093548	2.7705425525		1.92482		0.4133512		741.2458729637
2026-05-19	379.4882328914	248.449918113	65.5448156996		0.31247	37.3251212	4.4004160226	5.0155805645	2.7714904275		2.045375		0.37945		745.7328699886
2026-05-20	379.7258963254	167.2951559079	65.5346968304		0.18423	35.67315	4.4018922774	5.0181958871	2.7724687825		1.52073		0.3338504		662.4602664777
2026-05-21	379.8507307979	184.355184437	65.641905596		0.23652	32.3856108	4.4034146871	5.0193814516	2.7732368925		1.45969		0.3508532		676.4765279341
2026-05-22	380.0555267337	194.4028490768	65.578960916		0.24393	38.7491644	4.4045893516	5.021336371	2.7739542125		2.19909		0.3074548		693.7368559336
2026-05-23	380.2430625109	176.9981525406	65.5753698597		0.22179	18.1426524	4.405691471	5.0232256452	2.774985665		0.93443		0.248762		654.5681221534
2026-05-24	380.4023674318	164.5522206505	65.5405282904		0.14866	31.1257728	4.4073199484	5.0250350806	2.7755855275		1.87595		0.3029144		656.1563542012
2026-05-25	380.5867953578	182.0848322045	65.5494564347		0.12875	38.0134176	4.4082564742	5.0262733065	2.776478605		2.012375		0.3055304		680.8921654467
2026-05-26	380.7355878722	211.1529441664	65.6197727688		0.14374	43.4014436	4.4096624677	5.0272616129			1.69436		0.331646		712.51641856
2026-05-27															0

[arianvp]

Alright it seems to match up with the pricing of Intelligent Tiering - Frequent Access

  Expected monthly cost at INT-FA rates:
  - First 50TB: 50,000 GB × $0.023 = $1,150
  - Next 450TB: 450,000 GB × $0.022 = $9,900
  - Remaining ~45.7TB: 45,700 GB × $0.021 = $959
  - Total: ~$12,009/month ≈ ~$400/day ✓ matches your ~$380–396/day observed

  Previously on Standard-IA:
  - 545,700 GB × $0.0125 = ~$6,821/month ≈ ~$227/day

We double checked with Amazon Q, Amazon's AI hallucination engine when applying this and it assured us that it would move objects into the correct intelligent tiering subtier based on object age. Apparently that was a lie.

This means that after 14 june (30 days) we should be back to our normal cost as then objects are moved into Intelligent Tiering - Infrequent Access and after 90 days we should start seeing cost-savings due to objects being moved into Intelligent Tiering - Archive Access

TL;DR don't believe the Amazon Q hallucination Machine

[arianvp]

We can not influence this "intelligent" tiering so we just have to sit out 30 days I think.

But it's so extremely silly that they wouldn't move Infrequent Access objects directly into "Intelligent Tiering - Infrequent Access".

Anyhow this is all AWS sponsorship money anyway and I think amortized over time this still hopefully optimizes cost; but May/Jun is gonna be an expensive month

[arianvp]

@NixOS/foundation could we make sure we let AWS know that the May/Jun bill will be expected to be higher? But we hope to see cost savings in 90 days as things transition into archive storage

[infinisil]

I'll see about it, thanks for the ping!

[arianvp]

Confirmed that this is indeed how it works

https://xcancel.com/QuinnyPig/status/2062923343440011437

[mweinelt]

We're now seeing the tiering shift towards infrequent access again as expected.