It’s very easy to waste money on AWS without meaning to, or even realizing it. Even after you make the effort to calculate your specific RI needs, you can end up with too much or too little down the line. As busy as your company is with other matters, taking the time and energy it requires to keep your RI purchases and general AWS spend optimized is virtually impossible without help.

In previous articles, we looks at /blog/top-five-aws-reserved-instance-mistakes and in this article, we discuss how the CloudMGR RI Tool can assist with AWS Reserved Instance Management.

Managing your company’s Reserved Instances can be a daunting and difficult task. Calculating your needs in the first place is complicated enough, much less monitoring your continued needs over time

Without help, it’s no wonder so many companies make mistakes in their RI purchases or adjust to changing circumstances over the course of the RI term.

1. Purchasing.

Buying a new RI is simple. A form allows you to specify exactly what you’re looking for, from the term of the reservation to the product description to the availability zone, and the tool will show you available RIs that meet those specifications, in a range of prices, as well as AWS’s different payment options.

2. Server Coverage.

The RI tool’s server coverage pool can help you organize your servers by region, availability zone, and server type. This way, you can view them all at a glance and view the estimated annual cost of each server, and whether it’s saving or losing you money with its usage.

3. Auto Scheduling.

This feature helps you manage your resources better so that you can automatically turn off servers when they’re not in use, and only turn them on when they’re needed. It monitors servers and optimizes their functionality so that you only need to pay for the servers that you’re using.

4. Assisted Changes.

In many cases CloudMGR can make help you make changes to your underlying servers so they align with your RI’s and you maximise your investment.

5. Sell.

If it is not possible to make changes to your underlying server structure to match your RI’s then they can be listed for sale on the RI marketplace. (It should be noted that volumes are low so it may not be possible to sell the RI).

Fortunately, CloudMGR’s RI tool provides you with that assistance. It lets you sort and organize all of your important RI and server data, view all of it at a glance, and calculate your RI needs simply and accurately. It’s the best, most efficient way to understand the ins and outs of your Reserved Instance investment and ultimately save money on your AWS spend