A user named freebie is surprised to be charged for data transfer on AWS despite having only one Discourse instance on a new account. marianord confirms this is standard AWS pricing: charges apply for both the VM and outbound traffic. Jagster adds that inbound traffic can also be charged per request. Seeking alternatives, freebie asks about other platforms; Jagster suggests VPS providers like DigitalOcean, which offer predictable monthly pricing regardless of visitor volume. merefield notes Scaleway also has no bandwidth charges. freebie then asks if using a CDN would help reduce costs. pfaffman confirms it would — the CDN caches content (e.g., from S3) and serves it repeatedly without re-fetching, reducing AWS egress fees. Jagster adds that this caching works within the CDN’s TTL (Time to Live) window. In short, AWS charges for data egress, but alternatives like VPS hosts or CDNs can mitigate or eliminate those costs.
Hello,
I am getting charged for data transfer on was. It is a new account (1-month-old) and only has one instance (running discourse). This is what they say,
When you transfer data from AWS resources to the internet, you’re charged per service, with rates specific to the originating Region.
That’s exactly how AWS works. They charge you for the VM and for the outbound traffic.
And quite often inbound is charged too, per requests-
Any alternative for discourse’s then?
Every VPS-services, like DigitalOcean etc. Then you have same price every month have you one or hundred visitors.
No bandwidth charges on Scaleway either.
Will using a cdn help reduce costs?
Yes. The CDN will load the data from s3 only once (or maybe once or zone depending on how it works).
Inside TTL I reckon?