---
title: "Cost comparison"
slug: "cost-comparison"
updated: 2026-09-18T05:57:05Z
published: 2026-09-18T05:57:05Z
canonical: "docs.turbo360.com/cost-comparison"
---

> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.turbo360.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Cost comparison

## Overview

**Cost comparison** is a document type in Azure Documenter that compares the costs of subscriptions and resources across two different billing periods.

### Business value

Cost comparison documents let finance and cloud operations teams quantify cost changes across billing periods at the resource, resource group, resource type, and location level, without manually cross-referencing two separate cost exports.

## Prerequisites

### Required permissions

| Role | Permission level | Access |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Account owner, Owner, Contributor | — | Full access to the Documentation section |
| Custom role | Read | View documents generated under Documentation |
| Custom role | Manage | View, generate, and manage documents under Documentation |

## How it works

The Cost comparison document shows cost data for each subscription across two billing periods, broken down by multiple dimensions for a complete picture of cost movement.

### Summary

The document opens with a summary table listing all selected subscriptions with their Date Range 1 cost, Date Range 2 cost, Cost Change (USD), and Change %, providing an immediate cross-subscription view.

### Per-subscription breakdowns

For each subscription, the document provides six cost comparison tables:

- **Resource cost comparison:** per-resource costs across both date ranges, with Cost Change and Change %
- **Resource type cost comparison:** costs grouped by Azure resource type (e.g., SQL Databases, App Services, Virtual Machines)
- **Resource group cost comparison:** costs grouped by resource group
- **Location cost comparison:** costs grouped by Azure region
- **Tag cost comparison:** costs grouped by resource tags; shown as "Unable to retrieve" if Azure tag data is unavailable
- **Service name cost comparison:** costs grouped by Azure service name (e.g., SQL Database, Azure App Service, Virtual Network)

Each comparison table shows the entity name alongside Date Range 1 cost, Date Range 2 cost, Cost Change (USD), and Change %. Cost increases are shown with an up arrow (↑) and cost decreases with a down arrow (↓).

### Comparison insights

The change percentage for each organized category is shown in the generated document for the two date ranges. Red values denote an increase in cost for the category; green values denote a decrease in cost, since a cost reduction is in the user's favor.

The generated document also includes a section listing subscriptions that have no difference between the two comparison periods.

## Steps

Use the following steps to generate a Cost comparison document. Navigate to **Azure Documenter** to get started.

1. Click **New configuration**. The **Configure your document** wizard opens.
2. In **Step 1: Basics**, enter a configuration name. Under **Choose document type**, select **Cost comparison**. Configure the following options:
  - **Date range 1:** the first billing period for comparison (default: Last month)
  - **Date range 2:** the second billing period for comparison (default: This month)
  - **Currency:** the currency in which cost data is displayed
  - **Ignore cost lesser than:** excludes resources below the specified cost threshold from the output (default: 0)
3. In **Step 2: Service principal**, select the service principal and configure the subscription scope. Click **Next**.
4. Complete **Steps 3–6** (Branding, Publish settings, Schedule, Notifications) as required. Click **Next** after each step.
5. In **Step 7: Review**, confirm your configuration and click **Finish**.

Once generation is complete, a **URL** is created for the document, and you can download it using the **Download** link.

## Example scenario

A finance team wants to understand why cloud spend increased month over month. They generate a Cost comparison document for their production subscriptions with **Date range 1** set to the prior month and **Date range 2** set to the current month, then review the resource groups flagged in red for the largest increases.

## Troubleshooting

1. **Cost comparison document shows no data for one date range** Cause: no billing data exists for the selected period, for example a future month or a period with no activity. Fix: select a date range with confirmed billing history and regenerate.
2. **Document generation fails or returns incomplete data** Cause: the service principal lacks billing read permissions on one or more selected subscriptions. Fix: verify the service principal has at least Reader access on all selected subscriptions, then regenerate.
3. **Cost values appear in an unexpected currency** Cause: the Currency setting was not applied, or the subscription's native billing currency differs from the configured value. Fix: edit the configuration, verify the **Currency** field in Step 1: Basics, and regenerate.

## FAQs

1. **What do the red and green values in a Cost comparison document mean?** Red values denote an increase in cost for that category between the two date ranges. Green values denote a decrease in cost, since a reduction is in the user's favor.
2. **What happens to subscriptions that show no cost difference between the two date ranges?** They are listed separately in a dedicated section of the generated document rather than mixed in with subscriptions that show a change.
3. **Can I filter out low-cost resources from the comparison?** Yes. Set the **Ignore cost lesser than** value in Step 1: Basics to exclude resources below that cost threshold.

## Related articles

- [Billing details](https://docs.turbo360.com/docs/billing-details)
- [Resource auditing](https://docs.turbo360.com/docs/resource-auditing)
- [Security compliance](https://docs.turbo360.com/docs/security-compliance)