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Azure Savings Analysis

nOps provides comprehensive savings analysis for your Azure environment by examining your actual cost and usage history. Our analysis engine processes your Cost and Usage exports to identify commitment waste, coverage gaps, and optimization opportunities; giving you a clear picture of where your Azure dollars are going and where you can save.

How nOps Azure Savings Analysis Works​

nOps ingests your Azure FOCUS exports, the industry-standard format for cloud billing data. By processing your historical cost records, we reconstruct your utilization patterns and build a precision savings model that surfaces:

  • Commitment Waste: Unused Reserved Instances (RIs) and Savings Plans.
  • Coverage Gaps: Steady-state workloads running on expensive On-Demand rates.
  • Effective Savings Rate: Your true realized savings after accounting for utilization.

Why FOCUS?​

FOCUS exports provide the most granular, accurate view of your Azure costs:

  • Amortized Costs: True daily cost of your commitments, not just purchase prices.
  • Utilization Flags: Explicit rows showing exactly when and where a reservation went unused.
  • Pricing Metadata: Detailed separation of list price versus effective price paid.

Prerequisites​

FOCUS Export Configuration: You must have Azure FOCUS exports configured and running in your Azure environment. See How to Set Up Microsoft Azure Focus Export with nOps Platform for setup instructions.

Historical Data: We recommend at least 6 months of historical backfill to generate comprehensive analysis. This period captures seasonality, quarter-end processing spikes, and long-running trends—ensuring our insights don't lock you into commitments based on temporary usage anomalies. See How to Backfill Azure FOCUS Export Data to generate historical data.

Storage Account Access: Access to the storage account containing your billing exports. nOps will access this data every 24 hours to refresh your analysis.

What You Get​

Once your data is connected, the nOps platform delivers:

1. Waste Identification​

Identify every dollar spent on unused commitments:

  • See which specific Reservations or Savings Plans are underutilized.
  • Quantify the monthly financial impact of idle commitments.
  • Understand utilization trends over time.

2. Coverage Analysis​

Map your compute usage against your existing commitments:

  • On-Demand vs. Covered: Visualize what percentage of your compute is running at full price.
  • Steady-State Detection: Identify workloads running continuously for 90+ days—prime candidates for new commitments.
  • Subscription-Level Breakdown: See coverage by subscription to prioritize optimization efforts.

3. Optimization Opportunities​

Based on your 6-month history, the platform projects the financial impact of optimizing your portfolio:

  • ROI Calculation: Projected savings from covering steady-state usage.
  • Break-even Analysis: Compare On-Demand costs versus 1-year and 3-year commitment terms.
  • Actionable Recommendations: Prioritized opportunities ranked by impact.

Getting Started​

To enable Azure Savings Analysis, follow these two steps:

Step 1: How to Set Up Microsoft Azure Focus Export with nOps Platform

  • Configure the daily export of your billing data to a storage account in your Azure environment.

Step 2: How to Backfill Azure FOCUS Export Data

  • Generate the historical data needed for nOps to deliver comprehensive analysis.

Once complete, your nOps dashboard will populate with savings insights based on your Azure billing data.