Subscription

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Subscription is a prepaid billing method where you pay in advance for a specified period, such as one month or one year, to secure a lower unit price and significant cost savings. The longer the subscription duration, the larger the discount. This topic describes suitable scenarios for subscription ECS resources, the implications of subscription ECS instance expiration, and the refund policy.

Scenarios

We recommend purchasing subscription resources if your business exhibits the following characteristics:

Predictable resource usage period.
Consistent resource utilization.
A need for long-term resource use.

Typical scenarios include 24/7 official website services, database services, and more.

Billing rules

Subscription is a prepaid model covering basic resource fees for instance type, system disk, data disk, image, and fixed bandwidth public traffic. If all resources configured at the time of instance purchase are billed by subscription, no additional fees will be incurred during the subscription period, and the instance will automatically shut down upon expiration. Midway adjustments to the instance configuration will require payment for any upgrades and may result in a refund for downgrades as per the refund policy.

Note

Additional fees may apply when purchasing a subscription instance if pay-as-you-go resources or features are configured during usage. To manage multiple billing methods, monitor your account balance to prevent service disruptions due to insufficient funds. For details on pay-as-you-go fees under a subscription, see the billing FAQ. To switch pay-as-you-go resources to subscription billing, see change billing method.
Subscription durations in Alibaba Cloud refer to calendar years and months. For instance, a one-month ECS instance purchased on a specific day in February 2025 will expire on the same day in March 2025, not 30 days later.

Basic Billable items

When purchasing an ECS instance with a paid image on a subscription basis, along with a data disk, a public IPv4 address, and pay-by-bandwidth billing, you can view the fee breakdown on the cloud server purchase page by clicking the view details button in the lower right corner.

The cost details of the instance purchased according to the assumed situation will include the following parts:

Instance: that is, instance type fee. The instance type fee is the basic fee you need to pay when purchasing a specified type of instance, including the computing resources (vCPU, memory, GPU) fee, non-detachable storage device (local disk) fee, and enhanced feature component fee under that instance type, excluding paid image, block storage (system disk, data disk), public bandwidth, snapshot, and other usage fees.
System disk: disk capacity fee.
Data disk: disk capacity fee.
Bandwidth: Public bandwidth (pay-by-bandwidth) costs, calculated based on the selected bandwidth size.
Image cost: Image license fee, based on the market price of the paid image.

You can check the billing rules of the corresponding billable items according to the billable items displayed in the billing details when you purchase.

Note

This scenario is only an example of billable items and billing rules. The actual billable items are subject to what is displayed when you purchase.

The price of a subscription instance varies based on the region, resource type, and subscription duration. The specific rules are outlined in the table below.

Billable items	Subscription price	Subscription duration

Billable items	Subscription price	Subscription duration
Instance type	The price of the same instance type may vary in different regions. For specific prices, see the ECS pricing page.	1 month to 1 year. For specific purchasable durations, see the order page.
Disk	The price of the same type of disk may vary in different regions. For specific prices, see the ECS pricing page.	This part of the resources in the subscription instance can only be purchased with the instance, and the purchase duration is the same as the instance purchase duration.
Public bandwidth (pay-by-bandwidth)	For public bandwidth prices in different regions, see the ECS pricing bandwidth pricing tab.
Image	For Alibaba Cloud public image unit prices, see image billing. The price of Alibaba Cloud Marketplace images is subject to the information displayed when the instance is created.

Upgrade and downgrade

If your business needs exceed the current instance configuration, you can modify the instance type, public bandwidth, and data disk configurations. For instructions, see overview of upgrade and downgrade methods. Upgrading or downgrading your instance involves the following fee adjustments:

Upgrade Configuration: You must pay the difference between the new configuration fee and the remaining value when upgrading. The specific fee is based on the information displayed during the upgrade process.
Downgrade Configuration: A refund will be issued after downgrading an instance. For the refund calculation method, see resource downgrade refund.

Change billing method

Subscription to pay-as-you-go

After creating a subscription ECS instance, you can switch to pay-as-you-go billing to recoup some costs and gain more flexibility. Ensure sufficient funds are available to prevent overdue payments from disrupting normal operations. For details on the process and impact of this change, see subscription to pay-as-you-go.

Pay-as-you-go to subscription

Converting a pay-as-you-go instance to a subscription can secure resources in advance and offer greater discounts. For details on the process and impact of this change, see pay-as-you-go to subscription.

Expiration and Renewal policy

It is advisable to renew subscription ECS resources before they expire or to save data through snapshots to prevent data and business loss. For additional inquiries, refer to the resource renewal FAQ.

Important

Once an instance expires, it may be stopped, and you will receive notifications to renew the instance. To ensure continuous service, please renew your instance promptly. For further inquiries, submit a ticket for assistance.

If auto-renewal is enabled for a subscription instance but renewal fails, the instance will cease services sometime between 00:00:00 on the 15th day after expiration and 00:00:00 on the 16th day after expiration.

The retention status of related ECS resources is as follows:

Resource Type	Within 15 Days After Expiration	15 Days After Expiration	30 Days After Expiration

Resource Type	Within 15 Days After Expiration	15 Days After Expiration	30 Days After Expiration
Computing Resources (vCPU and Memory)	The computing resources (vCPUs and memory) are retained, and the instance operates normally. Note You can start or stop a normally operating instance and connect to it using management terminals or other connection methods.	The computing resources (vCPUs and memory) are retained, but the instance stops providing services. Note Once stopped, you cannot connect to the instance or access websites hosted on it, which may result in service disruptions.	The computing resources (vCPUs and memory) are released.
Image	The image operating system license is available.	The image operating system license is unavailable.	The image operating system license is unavailable.
Block Storage	Cloud disks and their data are retained. The cloud disks operate normally. Local disks and their data are retained. The local disks work properly.	Cloud disks and their data are retained, but the disks are inaccessible. Local disks and their data are retained, but the local disks cannot be accessed.	Subscription disks are released, and their data is irrecoverable. Note Manually attached pay-as-you-go cloud disks not set to Release with Instance will cease services. Local disks are released, and their data is irrecoverable.
Public IP	The static public IP address of the ECS instance is retained. The elastic IP address (EIP) associated with the ECS instance remains unchanged.	The static public IP address of the ECS instance is retained. The elastic IP address (EIP) associated with the ECS instance remains unchanged.	The static public IP address of the ECS instance is released. The EIP is disassociated from the ECS instance.

After the instance expires, a Data Preservation button will appear under the Operation column on the Instance page. Before the instance is released, you can create a custom image or snapshots for each disk to preserve data.

Renewal operation guide

Before the instance expires, you can review how to renew a subscription instance to extend the service period of the related ECS instance.

View bill

After billing for resources, you can access detailed consumption data on Alibaba Cloud and retrieve the corresponding resource bills in the or bill details. This information allows you to confirm usage rates and discounts, along with reconstruct the cost calculation process. For guidance on utilizing the billing feature, see billing instructions.