savings-plan

name	savings-plan
description	Azure Compute Savings Plan — hourly commitment, family/region flexibility

Savings Plan

When to use this skill

• Workload mix changes frequently
• Multi-region or multi-family compute estate

Key concepts

• Commit to $/hour for 1y or 3y; discount applies up to that hourly amount.
• Covers most VM families and regions (with some exclusions like H-series, M-series).
• Overage charges PAYG; under-utilization is wasted commit.
• Generally a smaller % discount than RIs but more flexible — pick SP when SKU/region is fluid.
• Stacks with Hybrid Use Benefit.

Azure CLI examples

# Get savings plan recommendations
az billing-benefits savings-plan-order list -o table

Common pitfalls

• Buying SP when workloads are stable on one SKU — RI would give a deeper discount.
• Over-committing — wasted spend is harder to recover than RI exchange.
• Mixing SP + RI without modeling RI consumption first — SP only fills the gap.

References

• Microsoft Learn: search for "Savings Plan Azure VM" on https://learn.microsoft.com

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