Understanding the savings on a schedule

05 Aug 2026
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Understanding the savings on a schedule

Updated on 05 Aug 2026
5 Minutes to read

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In this page we will walk through an example of a schedule which is configured and understand how the savings are calculated and realized.

Top Level Schedule

Below is a definition of the meaning of the key columns in the schedule level settings.

Column	Description	More Info
List Cost	This is the sum of the list price for resources within the schedule	This is based on a 30 days cost
Potential Savings	This is the sum of the potential savings at resource level
Amortized Cost	This is the sum of the amortized cost for the resources in the schedule	This is based on the last 30 days This will include any impact of savings plans and reservations or hybrid benefit

Schedule Time Settings

The times I have configured my schedule for are shown below.

This equates to 50 hours in up time and 118 hours in downtime.

If the schedule is up for 50 hours and down for 118 hours then this means that for >70% of the time the resources will be in the down state and we will hope to see in the region of 70% savings compared to if the resources were in the up state for 100% of the time.

Schedule Resources

Below you can see I have 3 resources on this schedule.

Compare to Top Level image above:

List Cost = The list cost shown at scheduler level in the image earlier in the document is the sum of list cost for the resource in the list above. An explanation of list cost is below.
Savings = The savings shown at scheduler level in the image earlier in the document is a sum of the savings shown above.
Amortized Cost = The schedule level (image earlier in the document) amortized cost is the sum amortized cost shown in the image above. An explanation of Amortized cost is below.

The resource configuration above tells me:

Row in Schedule	Schedule Action	Up Configuration	Down Configuration
1 - App Service Plan	Downsize out of hours	Scale up to P2V3 Premium	Scale down to P0V3 Premium
2 - VM	Turn off out of hours	On (Standard D4as V4 SKU)	Off
3 - VM	Downsize out of hours	Scale up to —> (Standard D32as V4)	Scale up down to —> (Standard D2as V4)

The cost related columns in the resource view of the scheduler tell me the below info:

Column	Source	Description	More Info
List Cost	Azure list price for the sku	This is the Azure list price for the resource if it was in the up configuration for the entire 30 day period.	We use a 30 day period here so there is no confusion between months with different number of days.
Savings	Estimated based on configuration in the schedule	This is the expected savings compared to the list price based on the number of up and down hours configured on the schedule. It is based on a 30 day comparison.	As an example, if the list price for the resource was $100 and you turn it off for 50% of the time we would expect the savings to be $50
Amortized Cost	Based on previous cost data we have collected	This is the amortized cost that you have paid for this resource for the last 30 days	The typical example should be, with a virtual machine on a pay as you go pricing with no savings plans or RI,s and if the schedule was to turn the VM off for 50% of the time then the VM which costs $100 should have an amortized cost of $50. There are other factors that can come info plan in some circumstances such as the below. This will factor in any cost you have paid for any reservations, savings plans which may have been applied to the resource. If you have a reservation partially applying to the resource for different amounts month over month then this may make the amortized cost for the resource change when you look at this value from 1 month to the next. There may be cases where for the month you configure the schedule the Amortized cost is a lot lower than you might anticipate if you are increasing the size of the VM compared to normal

Column

Source

Description

More Info

List Cost

Azure list price for the sku

This is the Azure list price for the resource if it was in the up configuration for the entire 30 day period.

We use a 30 day period here so there is no confusion between months with different number of days.

Savings

Estimated based on configuration in the schedule

This is the expected savings compared to the list price based on the number of up and down hours configured on the schedule.

It is based on a 30 day comparison.

As an example, if the list price for the resource was $100 and you turn it off for 50% of the time we would expect the savings to be $50

Amortized Cost

Based on previous cost data we have collected

This is the amortized cost that you have paid for this resource for the last 30 days

The typical example should be, with a virtual machine on a pay as you go pricing with no savings plans or RI,s and if the schedule was to turn the VM off for 50% of the time then the VM which costs $100 should have an amortized cost of $50.

There are other factors that can come info plan in some circumstances such as the below.

This will factor in any cost you have paid for any reservations, savings plans which may have been applied to the resource.
If you have a reservation partially applying to the resource for different amounts month over month then this may make the amortized cost for the resource change when you look at this value from 1 month to the next.
There may be cases where for the month you configure the schedule the Amortized cost is a lot lower than you might anticipate if you are increasing the size of the VM compared to normal

Points to Note

In my example above you may notice that the VM (3rd row) I will be downsizing has a smaller than you might expect amortized cost. This is because in reality this resource has been set as a Standard D2as v4 VM SKU for the last month. In the schedule I will be moving it to a bigger size than normal during working hours so users have more power available but in the evening I will be shrinking it back to the smallest size.
In this sample schedule there are also reservations which apply to these resources quite often which can also affect the amortized cost which is why the amortized cost can look lower than the list cost before you start using the scheduler. In these Azure will attempt to reallocate your reservation to other azure resources provided there are resources which would be within the scope of the reservation. You need to be careful though if you are using a resource on a schedule that you intend to be picked up by a reservation, these are often competing optimization approaches and you need to check you dont end up with under utilized reservations.

Calculation

Resource Level Savings

Resource	If un scheduled	Scheduled Up	Scheduled Down	Savings
1 = App Service	P2V3 Premium App Service Region = West US 3, Linux 168 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.310 Expected Cost per week = $52.08 Expected cost for 30 days = $223.2	P2V3 Premium App Service Region = West US 3, Linux 50 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.310 Expected Cost per week = $15.50 Expected Cost for 30 days = $66.42	P0V3 Premium App Service Region = West US 3, Linux 118 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.078 Expected Cost per week = $9.15 Expected Cost for 30 days = $39.21	Unscheduled Cost = $223.2 Scheduled Cost = $127.57 Up = $66.42 Down $39.21 Savings = $95.63
2 = VM to stop / start	Standard D4as V4 Region = Central US State = On 168 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.217 Expected Cost per week = $36.45 Expected cost for 30 days = $156.24	Standard D4as V4 Region = Central US State = On 50 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.217 Expected Cost per week = $10.85 Expected cost for 30 days = $46.50	Standard D4as V4 Region = Central US State = Off 118 hours per week Cost Per Hour = 0 Expected Cost per week = 0 Expected cost for 30 days = 0	Unscheduled Cost = $156.24 Scheduled Cost = $46.50 Up = $46.50 Down $0 Savings = $109.74
3 = VM to scale up/down	Standard D16as V4 Region = East US State = On 168 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.768 Expected Cost per week = $129.02 Expected cost for 30 days = $552.96	Standard D16as V4 Region = East US State = On 50 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.768 Expected Cost per week = $38.4 Expected cost for 30 days = $164.57	Standard D2as V4 Region = East US State = On 118 hours per week Cost Per Hour = $0.096 Expected Cost per week = $11.328 Expected Cost for 30 days = $48.54	Unscheduled Cost = $552.96 Scheduled Cost = $213.11 Up = $164.57 Down $48.54 Savings = $339.85

Schedule Level Savings

Going back to the earlier top level image of the scheduler savings. This is calculated by totaling the resource level savings.

In this case Total Savings = $545.22

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What's Next

Understanding scheduler savings behaviour over time

Table of contents

Top Level Schedule
Schedule Time Settings
Schedule Resources
Calculation