Cost Anomaly Detection
Cost Anomaly Detection finds resources whose Azure spend has changed unexpectedly, either jumped up, dropped off, or shifted into a new pattern, so you can investigate before a budget surprise. Tune sensitivity once at the scanner, then refine the view on the Anomalies page or skim the dashboard widget for a quick read.
What You'll Learn
This documentation covers everything you need to detect, investigate, and tune cost anomalies:
- How StratoLens flags cost spikes and drops
- How to investigate anomalies on the Cost Anomalies page
- How to read the dashboard widget for at-a-glance signal
- How to tune scanner sensitivity so the page surfaces the changes that matter
- How to hide noisy resources without disabling detection
Key Capabilities
Cost Spikes and Drops
Flags a resource when its daily cost diverges meaningfully from that resource's recent baseline. Each flagged anomaly is labeled Cost Spike when cost went up, or Cost Drop when cost went down.
Increases and Decreases
Cost decreases are flagged alongside increases. A drop can mean a stopped resource, a freed reservation, or a misconfiguration worth investigating.
Tunable Sensitivity
Set the floor at the scanner with Minimum Change % and Minimum Dollar Change. The Anomalies page can apply tighter filters on top, but never looser ones.
One-Time Charges Hidden by Default
Reservation purchases, refunds, and Azure Marketplace charges are detected and filtered out of the page and the dashboard widget by default. Toggle them back on when you need to audit purchases.
Hide Noisy Resources
Suppress a resource from the Anomalies page, dashboard widget, notifications, and scheduled reports without affecting scanner detection. Add an optional reason for the audit log.
Correlate With Resource History
Each resource detail panel includes a Resource History section. See configuration changes and activity around the dates costs shifted to identify what triggered the anomaly.
Tree or Flat List View
Drill from subscription to resource group to resource, or switch to a flat list of every resource with anomalies sorted by severity or impact.
Feature Integration
Cost Anomaly Detection works closely with several other features:
- Dashboard: The Cost Anomalies widget on the default dashboard surfaces the top 7 most significant anomalies.
- Email Notifications: See Email Notificationsfor the "anomalies detected this scan" alert. Hidden resources are excluded.
- Scheduled Reports: See Scheduled Reports for the executive cost anomaly report. Hidden resources are excluded.
- Automated Scanning: Anomalies are computed during each scan. See Automated Scanning for scan cadence and history.
Documentation Sections
Start with the Overview to understand how detection works, then jump to the page or setting you need.
📘 Overview
How StratoLens decides what counts as an anomaly, the Cost Spike and Cost Drop labels, severity, direction, and where to find the data.
Read: Overview →🔍 Anomalies Explorer
The main investigation page. Drill subscription to resource group to resource, tune filters, and inspect a resource's cost trends and history.
Read: Anomalies Explorer →📊 Dashboard Widget
The Cost Anomalies widget on the default dashboard. Increase and decrease counts plus the top 7 most significant anomalies.
Read: Dashboard Widget →⚙️ Settings
Tune scanner sensitivity. Set the minimum percent and dollar change required to flag an anomaly during scans.
Read: Settings →Want to learn more about what Cost Anomaly Detection can do?
Check out the feature page for benefits, use cases, and highlights.
View Feature Page