# AWS S3 optimization | Cloud Efficiency Hub Canonical: https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-s3 15 documented AWS S3 cost inefficiencies, each with how to detect it and how to fix it. [Cloud Efficiency Hub](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub) 15 documented AWS S3 cost inefficiencies, each with how to detect it and how to fix it. ## 15 inefficiencies [All services](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub#browse-by-service) - AWS S3 CER-0334 ### [Excessive S3 Request Costs from Filesystem-Oriented I/O Patterns](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/excessive-s3-request-costs-from-filesystem-oriented-i-o-patterns) Amazon S3 bills for nearly every API request - LIST, HEAD, GET, PUT, COPY, and POST - independently of storage charges (DELETE and CANCEL requests are free). Workloads originally designed for locally-provisioned storage, where listing a... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0330 ### [Orphaned MLflow Training Artifacts and Model Checkpoints in Object Storage](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/orphaned-mlflow-training-artifacts-and-model-checkpoints-in-object-storage) Machine learning experimentation workflows - particularly those managed through experiment tracking platforms - generate large volumes of artifacts in object storage. Every training run produces model checkpoints, evaluation outputs,... AI - AWS S3 CER-0307 ### [S3 Standard - Infrequent Access Used Where Intelligent Tiering Would Be Cheaper](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/s3-standard-ia-used-where-intelligent-tiering-would-be-more-cost-effective) Organizations often use the Standard - Infrequent Access (Standard-IA) storage class based on documentation and code that predate 2021 updates to the Intelligent Tiering storage class. Intelligent Tiering became suitable as an initial S3... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0303 ### [Orphaned Cloud Storage from Dropped External Delta Tables in Databricks](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/orphaned-cloud-storage-from-dropped-external-delta-tables-in-databricks) When external Delta tables are dropped from Databricks Unity Catalog or the legacy Hive metastore, only the table metadata is removed - the underlying data files in cloud object storage (such as S3, ADLS, or GCS) remain untouched and... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0237 ### [Unexpired Non-Current Object Versions in S3](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/unexpired-non-current-object-versions-in-s3) When S3 versioning is enabled but no lifecycle rules are defined for non-current objects, outdated versions accumulate indefinitely. These non-current versions are rarely accessed but continue to incur storage charges. Over time, this... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0229 ### [Excessive KMS Charges from Missing S3 Bucket Key Configuration](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/excessive-kms-charges-from-missing-s3-bucket-key-configuration) S3 buckets configured with SSE-KMS but without Bucket Keys generate a separate KMS request for each object operation. This behavior results in disproportionately high KMS request costs for data-intensive workloads such as analytics,... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0200 ### [Unused S3 Storage Lens Advanced](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/unused-s3-storage-lens-advanced) S3 Storage Lens Advanced provides valuable insights into storage usage and trends, but it incurs a recurring cost. Organisations often enable it during an optimization initiative but fail to turn it off afterwards. When no active storage... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0160 ### [Misaligned S3 Storage Tier Selection Based on Access Patterns](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/misaligned-s3-storage-tier-selection-based-on-access-patterns) While moving objects to colder storage classes like Glacier or Infrequent Access (IA) can reduce storage costs, premature transitions without analyzing historical access patterns can lead to unintended expenses. Retrieval charges, restore... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0054 ### [Excessive CloudTrail Charges from Bulk S3 Deletes](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/excessive-cloudtrail-charges-from-bulk-s3-deletes) When large numbers of objects are deleted from S3 - such as during scripted cleanups or batch jobs that call DeleteObject or DeleteObjects-CloudTrail can log every individual delete operation if data event logging is enabled. This is... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0161 ### [Missing S3 Gateway Endpoint for Intra-Region EC2 Access](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/missing-s3-gateway-endpoint-for-intra-region-ec2-access) When EC2 instances in private subnets access Amazon S3 in the same region without a Gateway VPC Endpoint, traffic is routed through a NAT Gateway to the public S3 endpoint. Data transfer from S3 to EC2 in the same region is free, but every... Networking - AWS S3 CER-0076 ### [Missing S3 Lifecycle Policy for Incomplete Multipart Uploads](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/missing-s3-lifecycle-policy-for-incomplete-multipart-uploads) Multipart upload allows large files to be uploaded in segments. Each part is stored individually until the upload is finalized by a "CompleteMultipartUpload" request. If this final request is never issued-due to a timeout, crash, failed... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0037 ### [Inactive S3 Bucket](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/inactive-s3-bucket) S3 buckets often persist after projects complete or when the associated workloads have been retired. If a bucket is no longer being read from or written to - and its contents are not required for compliance, backup, or retention... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0032 ### [Delayed Transition of Objects to Intelligent-Tiering in an S3 Bucket](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/delayed-transition-of-objects-to-intelligent-tiering-in-an-s3-bucket) Some S3 lifecycle policies are configured to transition objects from Standard storage to Intelligent-Tiering after a fixed number of days (e.g., 30 days). This creates a delay where objects reside in S3 Standard, incurring higher storage... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0070 ### [Infrequently Accessed Objects Stored in S3 Standard Tier](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/infrequently-accessed-objects-stored-in-s3-standard-tier) S3 Standard is the default storage class and is often used by default even for data that is rarely accessed. Keeping large volumes of infrequently accessed data in S3 Standard leads to unnecessary costs. Data such as backups, logs,... Storage - AWS S3 CER-0397 ### [Lifecycle Transitions of Small S3 Objects to Glacier Storage Classes](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/inefficiencies/lifecycle-transitions-of-small-s3-objects-to-glacier-storage-classes) Archiving to S3 Glacier Flexible Retrieval or S3 Glacier Deep Archive only saves money when the per-GB storage discount outweighs the fixed per-object costs of getting there. Every object transitioned by a lifecycle rule is a billable... Storage ## More AWS services - [AWS EC2 23](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-ec2) - [AWS RDS 19](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-rds) - [AWS Lambda 12](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-lambda) - [AWS EBS 10](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-ebs) - [AWS CloudWatch 8](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-cloudwatch) - [AWS EKS 8](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-eks) - [AWS ElastiCache 8](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-elasticache) - [AWS DynamoDB 7](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-dynamodb) - [AWS Bedrock 6](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-bedrock) - [AWS ELB 6](https://www.pointfive.co/efficiency-hub/cloud-services/aws-elb) --- Source: the public page above. Product screenshots and illustrative interfaces are examples, not live customer data.