Billing

Billing Items

ECSs are billed based on ECS specifications and the service duration.

**Table 1** ECS billing
Billing Item	Description
ECS	Pricing is based on the ECS type, flavor (including vCPUs and memory), service duration, and the number of purchased ECSs. For pricing details, see Elastic Cloud Server Pricing Details.
Image	Public images of the community edition, such as Linux, are free of charge.
EVS disk	EVS disks are mandatory. A system disk is 40 GB by default. EVS disks can be billed on a pay-per-use or yearly/monthly basis. For pricing details, see Elastic Volume Service Pricing Details. The usage duration of EVS disks should be the same as the associated ECS.
EIP	A public IP address is required for public accessibility. For pricing details, see Elastic IP Pricing Details.
Bandwidth	An EIP can be billed by bandwidth or traffic. For pricing details, see Billed By Bandwidth.

Billing Modes

An ECS can be billed on a pay-per-use, spot pricing, or yearly/monthly basis.

Yearly/Monthly: The ECS will be billed based on the service duration. This cost-effective mode is ideal when the duration of ECS usage is predictable.
Pay-per-use: The ECS will be billed based on usage frequency and duration. This mode is ideal when you want more flexibility and control on ECS usage.
Spot pricing: The ECS will be billed based on the price that is effective for the time it is being used. This mode is more cost-effective than pay-per-use, and the price will be adjusted based on supply-and-demand changes.

Table 2 lists the differences between the billing modes.

**Table 2** Billing modes
Billing Mode	Yearly/Monthly	Pay-per-Use	Spot Pricing
Payment Method	Prepaid Billed by the purchased duration specified in the order.	Postpaid Billed by service duration.	Postpaid Billed at the market price, which varies according to the changes in supply and demand. The start price of the bill is the market price when the ECS was purchased, and then the ECS is billed at the market price on the hour. Learn more about spot pricing
Billing Period	Billed by the purchased duration specified in the order.	Billed by the second and settled by the hour.	Billed by the second and settled by the hour.
Billing for Stopped ECS	Billed by the purchased duration specified in the order, regardless of whether the ECS is stopped or not.	After a common ECS (without local disks or FPGAs attached) is stopped, basic resources (vCPUs, memory, image, and GPUs) are not billed. Other resources (EVS disks, EIPs, and bandwidth) associated with the ECS will continue to be billed. An ECS with local disks attached, an FPGA-based ECS, or a bare metal ECS will continue to generate costs even after being stopped. Its vCPUs and memory are retained. To stop the ECS from being billed, delete it and its associated resources.	After a common ECS (without local disks or FPGAs attached) is stopped, basic resources (vCPUs, memory, image, and GPUs) are not billed. Other resources (EVS disks, EIPs, and bandwidth) associated with the ECS will continue to be billed. An ECS with local disks attached, an FPGA-based ECS, or a bare metal ECS will continue to generate costs even after being stopped. Its vCPUs and memory are retained. To avoid being billed for such an ECS, delete it and its associated resources.
Billing Mode Change	Can be changed to pay-per-use. Changing Yearly/Monthly to Pay-per-Use	Can be changed to yearly/monthly. Changing the Billing Mode from Pay-per-Use to Yearly/Monthly	Cannot be changed to pay-per-use or yearly/monthly.
Specification Modification	Supported	Supported	Not supported
Application Scenarios	This cost-effective mode is ideal when the duration of ECS usage is predictable. The yearly/monthly mode is recommended for long-term users.	This mode is ideal when you want more flexibility and control on ECS usage.	Spot ECSs can be reclaimed at any time and are suitable for stateless, fault-tolerant instances that are not sensitive to interruptions.

Yearly/Monthly: This mode provides a larger discount than pay-per-use and is recommended for long-term users. A yearly/monthly ECS is billed based on the purchased duration specified in the order.
Pay-per-use: a flexible mode with the billing accurately down to the second.
An ECS is billed from the time when it is provisioned to the time when it is deleted.
Common ECSs refer to ECSs without local disks or FPGAs attached. After a common ECS is stopped, it is billed as follows:
- ECS basic resources (vCPUs, memory, image, and GPUs) no longer generate costs. Its associated resources such as its EVS disks, EIPs, and bandwidth will continue to be billed.
- When you try to start the ECS the next time, the system will allocate vCPUs and memory again, but if resources are insufficient, the startup may fail. In this case, you can try again later or resize the ECS specifications first before trying to start it.
Special pay-per-use ECSs will continue to be billed after being stopped and its resources such as vCPUs and memory are still retained.
Special ECSs include:
- Bare metal ECSs
- ECSs attached with local disks, such as disk-intensive ECSs and ultra-high I/O ECSs
- FPGA-based ECSs
To stop billing for special ECSs, delete them and their associated resources.

Spot pricing
Price: Spot ECSs are billed based on the market price, which varies according to the changes in supply and demand. The maximum price you are willing to pay is not used as a billing basis. A higher price ensures a greater success rate for you to purchase such an ECS. A spot ECS can be used only when the market price is lower than the maximum price you are willing to pay and inventory resources are sufficient. When the market price exceeds the maximum price, the ECS will be reclaimed.

Billing period: A spot ECS is billed by the second. A bill is generated on the hour. The start price of the bill is the market price when the ECS was purchased, and the market price of the hour is used for billing.

Associated services: Spot pricing applies only to vCPUs and memory. The OS, system disk, data disk, bandwidth, and IP address are billed following the billing rules for these items in pay-per-use billing mode. A system disk is created and released with the ECS to which the system disk is attached. A data disk must be manually deleted.

Coupons: Coupons are not applicable to spot ECSs.

Billing Examples

In both pay-per-use and spot pricing billing modes, ECSs are billed by the second. The price per second of each type of ECS can be obtained by dividing their hourly price by 3600. Obtain the hourly price on the Product Pricing Details page.

For example, if you purchase a pay-per-use ECS priced $0.68 USD/hour, the ECS will be billed based on the usage duration by the second.

If you use the ECS for 30 minutes, you need to pay for $0.34 USD (0.68/3600 x 30 x 60).
If you use the ECS for 1 hour and 30 minutes, you need to pay for $1.02 USD (0.68/3600 x 90 x 60).

Configuration Changes

Changing the billing mode
- Changing from pay-per-use to yearly/monthly: After the billing mode of an ECS is changed from pay-per-use to yearly/monthly, a new order is then generated for you, and the new billing mode takes effect immediately after you pay for the order.
- Changing from yearly/monthly to pay-per-use: The pay-per-use billing mode will take effect after the original yearly/monthly subscription has expired.
- A spot ECS cannot be changed to a pay-per-use or yearly/monthly ECS.
Modifying ECS specifications
For an ECS billed on a yearly/monthly or pay-per-use basis, you can modify its specifications (vCPUs and memory). However, a spot ECS does not support specifications modification.

Notes
- Vouchers will not be refunded if the specifications of the ECS purchased with those vouchers are downgraded.
- If ECS specifications are upgraded, the price difference between the original and new specifications must be returned according to the in-service duration.
  - For pay-per-use ECSs: The specification modifications take effect immediately.
  - For yearly/monthly ECSs: The specification modifications take effect immediately within the original validity period. For details about the price difference, see Pricing of a Changed Specification.
- ECS specifications (vCPU or memory) degrade deteriorates the ECS performance.
- The price difference must be reimbursed if a downgraded ECS needs to be upgraded back to its original specifications.