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ApsaraMQ for Kafka:Pay-as-you-go billing

Last Updated:Mar 11, 2026

Pay-as-you-go billing charges you based on actual resource usage, settled hourly. This billing method suits testing, short-term workloads, and scenarios with unpredictable traffic peaks. Resources are allocated immediately and billed even when idle.

What you pay for

Billable itemRequiredDescription
Traffic specificationNoThe compute and processing capacity of your cluster, measured by elastic network interface (ENI) throughput.
Disk capacityYesStorage for messages and replicas. Supports ultra disks and SSDs.
PartitionsYesThe basic storage unit within a topic. Each traffic specification includes free partitions.
Internet trafficNoBandwidth for Internet access. Applies only to Internet- and VPC-connected instances.

Not charged: API calls are free regardless of volume.

After purchase, you are billed for allocated resources whether or not the instance processes messages. To stop charges, release the instance.

How costs are calculated

Total cost depends on your instance type.

Internet- and VPC-connected instances:

Total fees = (Internet traffic price + Traffic specification price + Disk unit price x Disk capacity / 100 + Partition price x Purchased partitions) x Hours

VPC-connected instances:

Total fees = (Traffic specification price + Disk unit price x Disk capacity / 100 + Partition price x Purchased partitions) x Hours
If you purchased an instance based on the legacy topic specification, replace the partition component with Topic price x Number of additional topics.

Pricing example

A VPC-connected Professional Edition (High Write) instance in Region group 1 with the following configuration:

ComponentConfigurationHourly unit price
Traffic specificationalikafka.hw.6xlarge$1.34
Disk capacity600 GB SSD$0.03 per 100 GB
Additional partitions200$0.000444 per partition

Hourly cost:

ItemCalculationCost
Traffic specification--$1.34
Disk capacity$0.03 x 600 / 100$0.18
Partitions$0.000444 x 200$0.09
Total per hour$1.61
Estimated monthly cost$1.61 x 24 x 30$1,159.20

Settlement rules

  • Billing cycle: Hourly. Any partial hour is rounded up to a full hour.

  • Bill generation: Every 24 hours. The previous day's fees are deducted from your Alibaba Cloud account balance.

  • Idle instances: Charged at the same rate as active instances. Release unused instances to stop charges.

To view billing details, see View billing details.

Billable item details

Traffic specification

The traffic specification determines your cluster's compute and processing capacity, measured by ENI throughput:

ENI traffic = Business traffic + Replication traffic
  • Business traffic: The actual messaging throughput generated by producers and consumers.

  • Replication traffic: The throughput consumed by data replication across the default 3 replicas.

Read/write ratios by edition:

EditionRead : Write ratio
Standard Edition (High Write)1:1
Professional Edition (High Write)1:1
Professional Edition (High Read)5:1

To choose the right traffic specification, compare the peak values of read and write traffic, then select a specification based on the higher value. Purchase approximately 130% of the peak value to create a buffer for traffic spikes.

For supported traffic specifications per edition, see Instance editions.

Disk capacity

Disk capacity stores your messages and their replicas.

  • Minimum capacity: Varies by traffic specification to balance performance and cost.

  • Disk types: Ultra disks and SSDs. SSDs deliver better performance.

  • Irreversible choice: The disk type cannot be changed after purchase.

  • 3 replicas by default: All data is stored in 3 replicas.

Usable storage by edition:

EditionPurchased capacityUsable capacityBackup storage
Standard Edition300 GB100 GB200 GB (included in purchased capacity)
Professional Edition300 GB300 GB600 GB (provided free of charge)
Important

Free backup storage for Professional Edition is only available for topics that use cloud storage as the storage engine. For details, see Comparison between storage engines.

The disk cost of a Professional Edition instance with 3 replicas is approximately 60% lower than a self-managed Apache Kafka cluster.

Manage disk usage: Adjust the Message Retention Period parameter to control how long messages are kept. The default retention is 72 hours, configurable from 24 to 480 hours. When disk usage reaches 85%, the system automatically deletes the oldest messages to maintain availability. For details, see Modify message configurations. For more information about message deletion, see When are historical messages deleted from ApsaraMQ for Kafka?

Partitions

Partitions are the basic storage unit within a topic. Each traffic specification includes a set of free partitions.

How partition counts work:

Total partitions = Free partitions (from traffic specification) + Purchased partitions
Available topics  = Total partitions
Available groups  = Total partitions x 2

Example: With the alikafka.hw.2xlarge traffic specification (1,000 free partitions) and 50 purchased partitions:

  • Total partitions: 1,050

  • Available topics: 1,050

  • Available groups: 2,100

For the number of partitions by instance type, see Instance editions.

Topic-based purchasing is no longer available. Existing instances purchased by topic specification have been automatically converted to partition-based specifications. The number of partitions after conversion is based on the number of topics that you purchased.

Internet traffic

Internet traffic is billed only for Internet- and VPC-connected instances. Pricing is based on elastic IP address (EIP) bandwidth using BGP (Multi-ISP) lines. Calculation results are rounded to three decimal places.

Pricing reference

The prices listed below are for reference only. Actual prices on the buy page prevail.

Internet traffic pricing

Region1 Mbit/s2 Mbit/s3 Mbit/s4 Mbit/s5 Mbit/s6 Mbit/s and higher (n = bandwidth)
All regions except SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)0.010.020.030.040.050.05 + (n - 5) x 0.03
SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)0.0120.0240.0360.0480.060.06 + (n - 5) x 0.036

Unit: USD per hour.

Traffic specification pricing

Prices vary by instance edition and region group. For region group definitions, see Region groups.

For traffic specifications supported by instances purchased based on the topic specification, see Free topics and partitions for topic-based instances.

Standard Edition (High Write)

Traffic specificationMax read ENI (MB/s)Max write ENI (MB/s)Free partitionsRegion group 1Region group 2Region group 3SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)
alikafka.hw.2xlarge3 x 203 x 201,0000.3350.4700.4200.564
alikafka.hw.3xlarge3 x 303 x 301,0000.4750.6500.5900.780
alikafka.hw.6xlarge3 x 603 x 601,0000.6550.8800.7901.056
alikafka.hw.9xlarge3 x 903 x 901,0000.8001.0500.9301.260
alikafka.hw.12xlarge3 x 1203 x 1201,0000.9601.2501.1001.500

Unit: USD per hour.

Professional Edition (High Write)

Traffic specificationMax read ENI (MB/s)Max write ENI (MB/s)Free partitionsRegion group 1Region group 2Region group 3SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)
alikafka.hw.2xlarge3 x 203 x 201,0000.801.171.061.404
alikafka.hw.3xlarge3 x 303 x 301,0000.991.451.311.740
alikafka.hw.6xlarge3 x 603 x 601,0001.341.9801.772.376
alikafka.hw.9xlarge3 x 903 x 901,0001.592.372.112.844
alikafka.hw.12xlarge3 x 1203 x 1201,0001.882.822.503.384
alikafka.hw.16xlarge3 x 1603 x 1602,0002.093.162.783.792
alikafka.hw.20xlarge3 x 2003 x 2002,0003.254.874.325.844
alikafka.hw.25xlarge3 x 2503 x 2502,0003.675.514.886.612
alikafka.hw.30xlarge3 x 3003 x 3002,0004.006.035.317.236
alikafka.hw.60xlarge3 x 6003 x 6002,0004.256.625.647.944
alikafka.hw.80xlarge3 x 8003 x 8002,0004.417.005.858.400
alikafka.hw.100xlarge3 x 1,0003 x 1,0003,0004.567.396.048.868
alikafka.hw.120xlarge3 x 1,2003 x 1,2003,0004.697.716.219.252
alikafka.hw.150xlarge3 x 1,5003 x 1,5003,0004.948.306.549.960
alikafka.hw.180xlarge3 x 1,8003 x 1,8003,0005.168.846.8310.608
alikafka.hw.200xlarge3 x 2,0003 x 2,0003,0005.349.297.0511.148

Unit: USD per hour.

Professional Edition (High Read)

Traffic specificationMax read ENI (MB/s)Max write ENI (MB/s)Free partitionsRegion group 1Region group 2Region group 3SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)
alikafka.hr.2xlarge50 + 2 x 1010 + 2 x 101,0000.801.171.061.404
alikafka.hr.3xlarge75 + 2 x 1515 + 2 x 151,0000.991.451.311.740
alikafka.hr.6xlarge150 + 2 x 3030 + 2 x 301,0001.341.981.772.376
alikafka.hr.9xlarge180 + 2 x 4545 + 2 x 451,0001.592.372.112.844
alikafka.hr.12xlarge240 + 2 x 6060 + 2 x 601,0001.882.822.503.384
alikafka.hr.16xlarge240 + 2 x 8080 + 2 x 802,0002.093.1602.7803.792
alikafka.hr.20xlarge300 + 2 x 100100 + 2 x 1002,0003.254.874.325.844
alikafka.hr.25xlarge375 + 2 x 125125 + 2 x 1252,0003.675.514.886.612
alikafka.hr.30xlarge450 + 2 x 150150 + 2 x 1502,0004.006.035.317.236
alikafka.hr.60xlarge900 + 2 x 300300 + 2 x 3002,0004.256.625.647.944
alikafka.hr.80xlarge1,200 + 2 x 400400 + 2 x 4002,0004.417.005.858.400
alikafka.hr.100xlarge1,500 + 2 x 500500 + 2 x 5003,0004.567.396.048.868
alikafka.hr.120xlarge1,800 + 2 x 600600 + 2 x 6003,0004.697.716.219.252
alikafka.hr.150xlarge2,250 + 2 x 750750 + 2 x 7503,0004.948.306.549.960
alikafka.hr.180xlarge2,700 + 2 x 900900 + 2 x 9003,0005.168.846.8310.608
alikafka.hr.200xlarge3,000 + 2 x 1,0001,000 + 2 x 1,0003,0005.349.297.0511.148

Unit: USD per hour.

Disk capacity pricing

Prices vary by disk type and region group. For region group definitions, see Region groups.

Disk typeDisk size (GB)Region group 1Region group 2Region group 3SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)
Ultra disk1000.010.020.020.024
SSD1000.030.040.040.048

Unit: USD per hour.

The disk cost of a Professional Edition instance with 3 replicas is approximately 60% lower than a self-managed open source Apache Kafka cluster.

Partition pricing

If the free partitions included in your traffic specification are not enough, purchase additional partitions. Prices vary by region group.

Billable itemRegion group 1Region group 2Region group 3SAU (Riyadh - Partner Region)
Partitions0.0004440.0006390.0005830.000767

Unit: USD per partition-hour.

For partition limits by instance type, see Instance editions.

Region groups

Region groupRegions
Region group 1China (Hangzhou), China (Shanghai), China (Qingdao), China (Beijing), China (Zhangjiakou), China (Hohhot), China (Ulanqab), China (Shenzhen), China (Heyuan), China (Guangzhou), China (Chengdu), China (Fuzhou - Local Region) (Closing Down)
Region group 2China (Hong Kong), Singapore, Japan (Tokyo), South Korea (Seoul), US (Virginia), US (Silicon Valley), Germany (Frankfurt), UK (London)
Region group 3Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur), Indonesia (Jakarta), Philippines (Manila), Thailand (Bangkok)

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