Container Service for Kubernetes:Billing FAQ

What are the total costs associated with an ACK managed cluster?

The total cost of running an ACK managed cluster consists of the following fees:

• Cluster management fee

  This is a fee charged at the cluster level and applies only to ACK managed Pro clusters. By default, this fee is charged based on the number of clusters and usage duration.

• Lingjun node management fee
  If you use a Lingjun node pool to manage Lingjun nodes, a specific management fee for these nodes will be charged.

• Cloud resource costs

  While using an ACK cluster, you will consume other Alibaba Cloud resources. These are billed separately according to their own pricing rules. Common examples include:

  • Elastic Compute Service (ECS) instances: Used as worker nodes in your cluster.

  • Elastic IP Addresses (EIPs): Used for public network communication.

For a comprehensive overview of all pricing details, see Billing overview.

When purchasing an ACK cluster, what are NAT Gateway CU Fee and API Server LCU Fee?

• Network Address Translation (NAT) Gateway

  NAT Gateways provide Internet access for clusters. Billing includes:

  • Instance fees

  • Capacity Unit (CU) fees, which are based on actual traffic.

  For billing details, see NAT Gateway billing.

  Note

  Use the NAT CU Estimator to estimate your CU consumption.

• API server

  The Kubernetes API server is exposed via Classic Load Balancer (CLB) instances. Billing for CLB instances consists of:

  • Instance fee

  • Charges for Load Balancer Capacity Units (LCUs), which are based on actual traffic usage.

  For billing details, see CLB billing.

  Note

  Use the CLB LCU Estimator to estimate your LCU consumption.

How do I change the billing methods of cloud resources in an ACK cluster to subscription?

By default, you are charged a cluster management fee for ACK Pro clusters on a pay-as-you-go basis. You cannot change the billing method of the cluster management fee to subscription.

The following table describes how to change the billing methods of different cloud resources to subscription.

Why do applications fail to restart after I change the billing method of a data disk mounted to an ECS instance from pay-as-you-go to subscription?

Subscription resources cannot be released or restarted on demand. Resources used in ACK clusters are restarted or released based on business requirements. If a pay-as-you-go data disk is attached to an ECS instance in your ACK cluster, do not change the billing method of the disk to subscription. Otherwise, applications on the instance cannot be restarted or updated.

If you want to change the billing method of a pay-as-you-go data disk mounted to an ECS instance in an ACK cluster to subscription, select Switch to Subscription in the Data Disk section.

Am I charged for a cluster in the Deleting or Deletion Failed state?

• You are charged only a cloud resource fee for an ACK managed Basic cluster or ACK dedicated cluster. When you delete a cluster or a cluster fails to be deleted, we recommend that you check the status of the cloud resources used by the cluster. If the cloud resources are not released, the billing of the resources continues.

• You are charged a cluster management fee and a cloud resource fee for an ACK managed Pro cluster. When a cluster is being deleted or fails to be deleted, the billing of cluster management stops but the billing of the cloud resources used by the cluster continues.

For more information, see Cluster lifecycle and Billing rules.

How is an ACK cluster in the Inactive or Unavailable state billed?

• You are charged only a cloud resource fee for an ACK managed Basic cluster or ACK dedicated cluster. If an ACK Basic cluster or ACK dedicated cluster is in an abnormal state, the billing of the cloud resources used by the cluster continues.

• You are charged a cluster management fee and a cloud resource fee for an ACK managed Pro cluster. When an ACK Pro cluster is in an abnormal state, ACK scales in the control plane of the cluster. After the control plane is scaled in, the billing of cluster management stops but the billing of the cloud resources used by the cluster continues.

For more information, see Cluster lifecycle and Billing rules.

When am I not charged a cluster management fee for an ACK cluster?

Cluster management: A cluster management fee is charged only for ACK managed Pro clusters. No cluster management fee is charged for ACK managed Basic clusters or ACK dedicated clusters.

When an ACK managed Pro cluster enters the following states, the billing of cluster management stops:

• Initializing

• Failed

• Inactive

• Unavailable

• Deleting

• Deletion Failed

• Deleted. Clusters in this state are invisible in the console.

For more information, see Cluster lifecycle and Billing rules.

Am I still charged for an ACK cluster that runs an outdated Kubernetes version?

The Kubernetes version of a cluster does not affect cluster billing. You can check whether your cluster is being billed based on the cluster status and the usage of cloud resources. For more information, see Cluster lifecycle and Billing rules.

Am I charged for ACK cluster updates?

Cluster updates are free of charge. By default, no cloud resources are created during the update process. If you manually create cloud resources during the update process, you may be charged for the created cloud resources.

Can I suspend the billing of an ACK cluster that is not in use?

No, you cannot suspend the billing of an ACK cluster when the cluster is not in use.

If your cluster is not in use, you can use the following methods to reduce the costs of cloud resources:

• Remove and release idle ECS nodes. For more information, see Remove a node and Release an instance.

• Enable the economical mode for idle ECS nodes. For more information, see Enable the economical mode.

• Release the cloud resources that are no longer in use and deactivate the cloud services that are not required.

  Important

  Do not release the CLB instance associated with the API server of your cluster. If you release the CLB instance, the cluster becomes unavailable and cannot be restored to a normal state.