Startups often see their AWS bills spiral unexpectedly. Simple infrastructure changes can cut costs by 90% without hurting performance. Spot Instances offer steep discounts for interruptible workloads like data processing.

Serverless functions like Lambda eliminate idle time costs for low-traffic services. Instead of running EC2 instances around the clock, Lambda charges only for actual compute usage.

Rethinking default choices like RDS can also yield savings. Specialized platforms such as PlanetScale and Neon often deliver better performance per dollar. Managing CloudWatch logs and reducing IPv4 usage further trim expenses.

These optimizations reshape startup unit economics. Spot Instances require interruption-aware design, while IPv6 adoption helps avoid AWS’s public IP fees, especially when paired with services like Cloudflare.