Kubecost Pricing 2026: Free to 250 Cores, Then $63.60 per Core per Year
Kubecost, now IBM Kubecost, allocates Kubernetes cost by namespace, workload and team. It prices on the CPU cores it monitors, not on your cloud bill. The free Foundations tier covers up to 250 cores; above that, IBM sells Enterprise Self-hosted through its own online store at a listed per-core annual price.
Every figure on this page was read from Kubecost's own pricing page, documentation, online store or its own AWS Marketplace listing on 1 October 2026, and each one links to where it came from. Kubecost has not reviewed this page. Nothing here is estimated: where the vendor publishes no number, the page says so. How we source prices.
At a Glance
Kubecost Editions
| Edition | Price | Key limits (verbatim where quoted) |
|---|---|---|
| Foundations | Always free | Unlimited clusters up to 250 cores; 15-day metric retention; Unlimited users |
| Enterprise Self-hosted | $63.60 per core per year (IBM store) | Unified, multi-cluster view; Unlimited metric retention; contact above 3,200 |
| Enterprise Cloud | Contact us | All Self-hosted features, managed by Kubecost |
Sources: apptio.com: IBM Kubecost (kubecost.com/pricing redirects here); IBM store: Kubecost Enterprise Self-Hosted, read 1 October 2026.
Enterprise Self-hosted on the IBM Store
As configured on the US IBM store at the minimum quantity.
| Line | Store figure |
|---|---|
| Unit price | $63.60/year per Virtual Processor Core |
| Minimum quantity | Minimum 250 Virtual Processor Cores |
| 250 cores, annual | $15,900.00 USD |
| One-time setup fee (required) | $2,120.00, shown reduced to $0.00 in the summary |
| Term | Annual, charged upfront, does not auto-renew |
Source: IBM store: Kubecost Enterprise Self-Hosted, read 1 October 2026.
The store page states that promotional pricing is valid only for new subscriptions and the initial term, and its summary reads "Discounts will apply for next 12 months". Sales tax may apply.
What Kubecost Publishes, and What It Does Not
Published
- ✓The free Foundations limits (250 cores, 15-day retention)
- ✓A per-core annual price, 250-core minimum and setup fee on the IBM store
- ✓That large deployments and Enterprise Cloud go through IBM sales
Not published
- -Renewal pricing after the promotional first term
- -Prices above 3,200 cores
- -Enterprise Cloud (managed SaaS) pricing
Reading the Numbers
The paid edition does not bill only the cores above the free 250. It starts at a 250-core minimum, so moving from Foundations to Enterprise Self-hosted is a $15,900 first-year step, plus the setup fee if it is charged. Per core, $63.60 a year is $5.30 a month.
If you only need allocation and can live with the open-source feature set, OpenCost is covered in the free tools guide. For how Kubecost sits next to Vantage and Infracost, see Vantage vs Kubecost vs Infracost.
How Kubecost Compares With the Other Graded Tools
Every tool graded on our FinOps tools comparison that has a published price or a published free position, with the vendor's own pricing basis. Figures are not normalised to one spend level because the vendors meter different things (spend, cores, resources, runs).
| Tool | Pricing basis | Published figure | Source (read 1 October 2026) |
|---|---|---|---|
| AWS Cost Explorer | Native, free console; API metered | Console free; API $0.01 per request | AWS docs + pricing page |
| Azure Cost Management | Native, no additional cost | Free for Azure | azure.microsoft.com pricing |
| GCP Billing | Native, no additional charge; BigQuery export billed | Tools and Billing APIs free; BigQuery usage charged | cloud.google.com/cost-management |
| Infracost | Flat monthly plan | Free (1,000 runs/mo); Starter $250/mo; Cloud $1,000/mo | infracost.io/pricing |
| Vantage | Flat monthly plan by tracked-spend cap | Free to $2,500 spend; Pro $30/mo; Business $200/mo to $20,000 spend | vantage.sh/pricing |
| CloudQuell | Flat monthly fee by spend band | Free under $10K spend; $99/mo to $50K; $199/mo to $200K | cloudquell.com/pricing |
| Kubecost (IBM) | Free to 250 cores; paid per core per year | $63.60 per core per year, 250-core minimum (IBM store) | IBM store listing |
| Hyperglance | Resource count, billed annually | $899/mo (500 resources) to $4,492/mo (5,000) | hyperglance.com/pricing |
| Spot by Flexera | Metered: vCPU-hours and savings realized | $1.415 per 100 vCPU hours (pay-as-you-go listing) | AWS Marketplace (sold by Spot) |
| Finout | Flat annual fee by committed-spend tier | No price published (quote) | finout.io/pricing |
| CloudHealth (Broadcom) | Committed Cloud Spend Units ($1 of spend each) | $45,000 per 12 months to $150K/mo AWS spend | AWS Marketplace (sold by VMware Tanzu CloudHealth) |
| Cloudability (IBM) | Contract by annual cloud spend managed | $30,000 per 12 months to $1M annual spend | AWS Marketplace (sold by IBM Software) |
| Flexera One | Contract by yearly cloud spend under management | $50,000 per 12 months to $1M yearly spend (CCO) | AWS Marketplace (sold by Flexera) |
OpenCost, also graded on /tools, is open-source software with no vendor price list, so it has no row here; see the free tools guide.
Kubecost Pricing FAQ
How much does Kubecost cost?
Kubecost Foundations is free for unlimited clusters up to 250 cores. Enterprise Self-hosted is sold on the IBM store at $63.60 per virtual processor core per year with a 250-core minimum, which the store totals at $15,900 a year, plus a required one-time setup fee listed at $2,120 (read 1 October 2026, US store). Enterprise Cloud, the managed SaaS edition, is contact-only.
Is Kubecost free?
Yes, up to a limit. IBM's Kubecost page lists Foundations as always free, with unlimited clusters up to 250 cores, 15-day metric retention and unlimited users, self-hosted.
Is the $63.60 per core Kubecost price a promotion?
Possibly. The IBM store page carries a notice that promotional pricing is valid only for new subscriptions and the initial subscription term, and its summary showed the setup fee reduced to $0.00 with the line 'Discounts will apply for next 12 months'. Check the store on the day you buy and expect renewal pricing to be confirmed separately.
What does Kubecost cost above 3,200 cores?
IBM does not list it. The Kubecost page asks deployments above 3,200 to contact IBM (the page's own wording says 'VPCs'). The Enterprise Cloud edition is also contact-only.
Sources
- apptio.com: IBM Kubecost: editions and Foundations limits (read 1 October 2026)
- IBM store: IBM Kubecost Self-Hosted, Enterprise Self-Hosted: per-core price, minimum, setup fee; rendered in a browser, US store (read 1 October 2026)
Vendor pricing read 1 October 2026