Amazon Redshift Pricing 2026
Complete pricing guide with plans, hidden costs, and negotiation tips
Amazon Redshift pricing varies by team size and features, ranging from $0.543 to $1.5 per month in 2026. Your actual cost depends on the tier you choose, contract length, and negotiated discounts.
Use the interactive pricing calculator to estimate your exact cost based on team size and requirements.
- Free tier: No free tier available
- Billing: Monthly and annual (save 15-20%)
- Hidden costs: Add ~35% for implementation, support, and training
Amazon Redshift offers 3 pricing tiers: Redshift Serverless, RA3 Provisioned (Managed Storage), DC2 Provisioned (Dense Compute). The RA3 Provisioned (Managed Storage) plan is production workloads with predictable compute needs and growing data volumes.
Compared to other data warehousing software, Amazon Redshift is positioned at the budget-friendly price point.
Amazon Redshift is AWS's fully managed cloud data warehouse service, offering both provisioned cluster and serverless deployment options. As one of the earliest cloud-native data warehouses, Redshift powers analytics for thousands of organizations ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies. The service offers three main pricing models: Serverless (pay per query), RA3 provisioned nodes (separate compute and storage), and DC2 provisioned nodes (bundled compute and storage).
Redshift pricing starts as low as $0.25/hour per node for DC2.large clusters, making it one of the most affordable entry points among enterprise data warehouses. Serverless pricing at $0.375/RPU-hour provides a hands-off option for variable workloads. For cost-conscious organizations, Reserved Instances offer up to 75% off on-demand rates with 1-3 year commitments. A typical mid-size deployment runs $2,000-$5,000/month, though enterprise clusters with RA3.16xlarge nodes can easily reach $30,000-$50,000+/month.
All Amazon Redshift Plans & Pricing
| Plan | Monthly | Annual | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| Redshift Serverless | Contact | Contact | Variable or unpredictable workloads, getting started quickly without capacity planning |
| RA3 Provisioned (Managed Storage) | Contact | Contact | Production workloads with predictable compute needs and growing data volumes |
| DC2 Provisioned (Dense Compute) | Contact | Contact | Smaller datasets where local SSD performance is critical |
View all features by plan
Redshift Serverless
- $0.375 per RPU-hour (US East)
- Minimum 8 RPUs base capacity (configurable)
- Per-second billing with 60-second minimum
- No infrastructure to manage
- Automatic scaling based on workload
- Pay only when queries are running
- Managed storage at $0.024/GB-month
- $300 free trial credit for new users
- Concurrency scaling included
RA3 Provisioned (Managed Storage)
- ra3.xlplus: $1.086/hr per node (4 vCPUs, 32 GB RAM, 32 TB managed storage)
- ra3.4xlarge: $3.26/hr per node (12 vCPUs, 96 GB RAM, 128 TB managed storage)
- ra3.16xlarge: $13.04/hr per node (48 vCPUs, 384 GB RAM, 128 TB managed storage)
- Managed storage at $0.024/GB-month (separate from compute)
- Scale compute independently from storage
- Automatic data tiering between SSD and S3
- Cross-region data sharing
- Reserved Instance discounts up to 75%
- Minimum 2 nodes for production clusters
DC2 Provisioned (Dense Compute)
- dc2.large: $0.25/hr per node (2 vCPUs, 15 GB RAM, 160 GB NVMe SSD)
- dc2.8xlarge: $4.80/hr per node (32 vCPUs, 244 GB RAM, 2.56 TB NVMe SSD)
- Local SSD storage included in node price
- Best price-performance for datasets under 500 GB
- 1 hour/day free concurrency scaling credits
- Reserved Instance discounts available
- Minimum 1 node (single-node cluster allowed)
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Frequently Asked Questions
01 How much does Amazon Redshift cost?
Amazon Redshift pricing starts at $0.25/hour per node for DC2.large provisioned clusters and $1.50/hour for Redshift Serverless (minimum 4 RPUs at $0.375/RPU-hour). RA3 managed storage nodes start at $1.09/hour. Reserved Instances offer up to 75% discounts for 1-3 year commitments.
02 Does Amazon Redshift have a free tier?
Amazon Redshift Serverless offers a $300 free trial credit with a 90-day expiration for new users who have never used the service before. This covers both compute and storage usage. There is no permanent free tier, but the trial is sufficient for evaluation and small proof-of-concept projects.
03 What is the cheapest way to run Redshift?
The cheapest option is DC2.large nodes at $0.25/hour ($182/month per node). For even lower costs, use Reserved Instances for up to 75% off (as low as ~$45/month per node on a 3-year commitment). Redshift Serverless can be cheaper for intermittent workloads since you only pay when queries are running.
04 What is the difference between Redshift Serverless and Provisioned?
Redshift Serverless automatically scales compute based on workload and charges per RPU-hour ($0.375/RPU-hour) only when active. Provisioned clusters require you to choose node types and are billed 24/7 whether queries are running or not. Serverless is simpler but can be more expensive for steady workloads; provisioned offers more control and lower costs for predictable usage.
05 How much does Redshift Spectrum cost?
Redshift Spectrum charges $5 per TB of data scanned from Amazon S3. This is billed separately from your Redshift cluster compute costs. You can reduce Spectrum costs by partitioning data in S3, using columnar formats like Parquet, and compressing files to minimize the amount of data scanned per query.