Question

A finance reporting application runs on a Cloud SQL for PostgreSQL instance sized at db-custom-16-104448 (16 vCPUs, 104 GB RAM). Cloud Monitoring shows average CPU utilization of 8% and peak utilization of 22% over the last 60 days, with query latency well within the SLO. The FinOps team wants to reduce the recurring cost of this instance while keeping performance headroom for peaks. What should the DevOps engineer do first?

Accepted Answer

Review the Cloud SQL rightsizing/recommender guidance, then resize the instance down to a smaller machine type that still comfortably covers the observed 22% peak, and validate latency after the change.

Answer

Enable a committed use discount for the current 16 vCPU machine type to lock in a lower rate for 1 year.

Answer

Migrate the workload to Spot VMs running a self-managed PostgreSQL container to cut compute costs.

Answer

Enable storage auto-resize on the instance to prevent paying for over-provisioned disk capacity.