Monitor Usage and spending using cost alerts
This article helps you understand and use Cost Management alerts to monitor your Azure usage and spending. Cost alerts are automatically generated based when Azure resources are consumed. Alerts show all active cost management and billing alerts together in one place. When your consumption reaches a given threshold, alerts are generated by Cost Management. There are three types of cost alerts: budget alerts, credit alerts, and department spending quota alerts.
Budget alerts
Budget alerts notify you when spending, based on usage or cost, reaches or exceeds the amount defined in the alert condition of the budget. Cost Management budgets are created using the Azure portal or the Azure Consumption API.
Credit alerts
Credit alerts notify you when your Azure credit monetary commitments are consumed. Monetary commitments are for organizations with Enterprise Agreements. Also, Credit alerts are generated automatically at 90% and at 100% of your Azure credit balance. Whenever an alert is generated, it’s reflected in cost alerts and in the email sent to the account owners.
Department spending quota alerts
Department spending quota alerts notify you when department spending reaches a fixed threshold of the quota. Spending quotas are configured in the EA portal. Whenever a threshold is met it generates an email to department owners and is shown in cost alerts. For example, 50% or 75% of the quota.
Supported alert features by offer categories
Support for alert types depends on the type of Azure account that you have (Microsoft offer). The following table shows the alert features that are supported by various Microsoft offers. You can view the full list of Microsoft offers at Understand Cost Management data.
| Alert type | Enterprise Agreement | Microsoft Customer Agreement | Web direct/Pay-As-You-Go |
|---|---|---|---|
| Budget | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
| Credit | ✔ | ✘ | ✘ |
| Department spending quota | ✔ | ✘ | ✘ |
View cost alerts
To view cost alerts, open the desired scope in the Azure portal and select Budgets in the menu. Use the Scope pill to switch to a different scope. Select Cost alerts in the menu.The total number of active and dismissed alerts appears on the cost alerts page.
Reference documentation – Use cost alerts to monitor usage and spending