Pay-as-you-go billing method of Realtime Compute for Apache Flink - Realtime Compute for Apache Flink

The pay-as-you-go billing method allows you to use resources before you pay for the resources. You do not need to purchase a large number of resources in advance. You are charged based on the actual resource usage of your workspaces. This topic describes the billing rules for the pay-as-you-go billing method, including the unit prices in different regions and information about how to terminate billing.

Important

We recommend that you configure the required resources in advance or use the subscription billing method for important business to ensure that resources are reserved. If you use the pay-as-you-go billing method, underlying physical resources are required when a job is started or restarted. If resources in specific regions or zones are extremely insufficient, tasks may fail to be started. This affects business continuity.

Item	Description
Scenario	The pay-as-you-go billing method is applicable to the following scenarios: Resource usage fluctuates. Resource usage may spike for a short period of time.
Billing rule	You are charged based on the number of compute units (CUs) consumed per minute. The billing cycle is 1 hour. The fees for each billing cycle include the computing resource fee and the management resource fee, which are calculated by using the following formulas: Computing resource fee = Number of CUs consumed per minute by computing resources in 1 hour/60 × Unit price per hour in the related region. For example, if 4 CUs are consumed per minute in the first half of an hour and 2 CUs are consumed per minute in the second half of an hour, the total number of consumed CUs in the hour is 180 (4 CUs × 30 minutes + 2 CUs × 30 minutes = 180). The computing resource fee is calculated by using the following formula: Computing resource fee = 180/60 × Unit price in the related region. Management resource fee = Management resource usage/60 × Number of CUs consumed by management resources × Unit price per hour in the related region. Management resource usage is fixed at 60 per hour, which indicates that the management resources are used for 60 minutes. The number of CUs consumed by management resources is fixed at 2. For more information about computing resources and management resources, see Billable items. For information about the unit prices of resources in different regions, see the Unit prices in different regions section of this topic. Important You can view the actual fees on the buy page. In the preceding formulas, fees are calculated for only one Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace. If you create multiple workspaces in an Alibaba Cloud account, your bill includes the fees for all workspaces.
Billing cycle	Fees are calculated on an hourly basis at the top of every hour based on the UTC+8:00 time zone. After the calculation is complete, a new billing cycle starts. When a billing cycle ends, the system generates a bill and deducts the fees from your Alibaba Cloud account.
Overdue payments and resource availability	The impact on your business varies based on the period of time after a pay-as-you-go workspace becomes overdue. For more information, see Overdue payments.
Resource release and billing termination	Before you terminate billing, make sure that data is backed up or migrated and your business is not affected. To terminate billing for a workspace, perform the following steps to release the workspace resources. After the workspace resources are released, you are no longer charged for the workspace. Log on to the management console of Realtime Compute for Apache Flink. In the top navigation bar, select the region in which your workspace resides. Find the workspace you want to manage and choose More > Release Resources in the Actions column. In the message that appears, click OK. Important After you release the resources of a workspace, resources that you uploaded to the associated Object Storage Service (OSS) bucket, such as JAR files, are still retained. If you do not run jobs or cancel all jobs in a pay-as-you-go workspace, you are not charged computing resource fees. However, you are still charged for management resources. To stop billing for a workspace, make sure that you release the workspace resources. Fees of Flink include fees for billable resources and management resources. The management resource fees for a billing cycle are calculated based on the following formula: Management resource fee = 2 CUs × Unit price in the related region. If billing continues for a workspace whose resources are released, view the bill to confirm the payment time.

Unit prices in different regions

Important

You can view the actual prices on the buy page.
You can only scale out existing resources in the China (Zhangjiakou) region and Zone H of the China (Hangzhou) region. You can purchase new resources in other regions and zones. The regions and zones supported by Realtime Compute for Apache Flink change. The information on the buy page prevails.

Region	Unit price (USD per CU-hour)
China (Shenzhen), China (Beijing), China (Shanghai), and China (Hangzhou)	0.06
China (Hong Kong)	0.09
Singapore	0.09
US (Silicon Valley)	0.07
Germany (Frankfurt)	0.10
Japan (Tokyo)	0.10
Indonesia (Jakarta)	0.08
UK (London)	0.09
Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur)	0.08
China (Zhangjiakou)	0.05

References

Am I charged when I create a pay-as-you-go workspace but do not run a deployment in the workspace?
Am I charged when a workspace fails to be created?
How do I apply for a refund when I no longer need to use a workspace?
For information about how to switch from a pay-as-you-go workspace to a subscription workspace, see Switch from pay-as-you-go to subscription.
For more information about how to create a workspace, see Activate Realtime Compute for Apache Flink.