Why is AWS Outbound Data Transfer so expensive?

AWS charges $0.09 per GB for data transferred from AWS to the internet. This sounds small but adds up fast: a video platform serving 1 TB/month pays $92 in egress fees alone. The charge reflects AWS's actual bandwidth costs — data centers pay for their internet connectivity by the bit. Inbound data (uploading to AWS) is free, but every response your server sends to users costs money.

What are the AWS Free Tier data transfer limits?

AWS Free Tier includes 100 GB of outbound data transfer per month (to the internet) for 12 months. After the free tier expires — or after 100 GB — you pay $0.09/GB. The first 10 TB/month is at $0.09/GB; additional data drops to $0.085/GB at 10 TB, $0.07 at 50 TB, and $0.05 at 150 TB+ (negotiated).

How can I reduce AWS egress costs?

Use Amazon CloudFront (CDN): CloudFront-to-internet egress costs $0.085/GB and reduces origin requests. Enable S3 Transfer Acceleration for large uploads. Use VPC endpoints to keep traffic within AWS (free for same-region S3). Move read-heavy workloads closer to users. For very high volume, negotiate a private pricing agreement with AWS.

Does AWS charge for data transfer between regions?

Yes. Data transferred between AWS regions costs $0.02/GB (in each direction). Data transferred within the same Availability Zone is free. Moving data between AZs in the same region costs $0.01/GB per direction. These inter-region costs are separate from internet egress and can surprise architects who design multi-region active-active deployments.

AWS Data Transfer (Egress) Fee Calculator

Calculate AWS egress (outbound data transfer) fees. See how much Amazon Web Services charges to send data to the internet, between regions, or via CloudFront — and why it's the top cause of unexpected AWS bills.

Type

Data Transfer (GB)

Enter a bid/price to see the fee breakdown.

Frequently asked questions

AWS Data Transfer (Egress) Fee Calculator — Outbound Bandwidth Cost Estimator

AWS egress fees are the top cause of 'why is my cloud bill so high?' moments. Sending data out of AWS to the internet costs $0.09 per GB after the first 100 GB free tier — and the free tier expires after 12 months. A single API endpoint with moderate traffic can easily send terabytes per month. This calculator shows your exact monthly egress cost so you can budget accurately or decide whether CloudFront is worth the setup.

Three egress scenarios

Calculate costs for internet egress ($0.09/GB), CloudFront distribution ($0.085/GB), or inter-region transfer ($0.02/GB).

Free tier applied automatically

The first 100 GB/month free tier is subtracted before calculating your billable data — for internet and CloudFront destinations.

Plan your architecture costs

Use this before deploying a data-heavy application to understand the ongoing bandwidth cost — not just compute and storage.

For media-heavy applications, egress can cost more than all compute combined. Evaluate CloudFront, optimize API response sizes, use compressed formats (WebP over PNG, GZIP), and consider a CDN-first architecture for user-facing assets.

Fee rates verified and updated April 2026. Rates may change — verify directly with the platform before transacting.