Explanation
Why the waste happens and who it affects.
In many cases, they continue to incur hourly charges despite no active traffic flowing through them. Because hourly fees are not tied to whether the gateway is needed-just whether it exists - these resources can quietly drive recurring costs without delivering ongoing value. Identifying and removing unused gateways is a simple way to reduce waste.
Billing model
The pricing dimensions that drive this cost.
NAT Gateway charges include:
- Hourly cost per deployed gateway per Availability Zone
- Charged as long as the gateway exists, regardless of usage
- Per-GB data processing fee
- Charged for all data passing through the NAT Gateway
There is no minimum usage threshold. Even an idle NAT Gateway accrues full hourly charges.
How to detect
5 checks to find it in your estate.
- List all NAT Gateways currently provisioned in each region
- Review flow logs, CloudWatch metrics, or billing data to confirm whether any data has been processed through the gateway during the lookback period
- Validate that no private subnet or route table is actively routing traffic through the NAT Gateway
- Determine whether the gateway was created as part of a dev, staging, or legacy environment that is no longer active
- Confirm with network or infrastructure owners whether the gateway is still required for any known process or dependency
How to fix
How to remove the waste.
Delete NAT Gateways that have shown no data transfer activity and are no longer required. Review associated route tables to ensure removal will not disrupt network connectivity. Consider automating periodic audits of NAT Gateway usage across environments.
Documentation
Vendor references for pricing and configuration.