---
title: "Cost by service, team and more"
canonical: "https://cloudmonitor.ai/docs/using-cloudmonitor/reports/cost-by/"
description: "Five ready-made breakdowns of the same bill: by cost group, service, subscription, resource group or tag."
---

These are [The Ledger](/docs/using-cloudmonitor/reports/the-ledger/) with the grouping already set.
Same rows, same totals, same filters — you're just spared the setup.

You reach them from the grouping controls on the Ledger, or from a link someone sent you.

| Breakdown | Answers |
|---|---|
| **Cost by Cost Group** | Which part of the business is this? Rolled up by cost group and business unit, with each group's share of the total and its change on the previous period |
| **Cost by Service** | What kind of thing are we buying? Virtual machines, storage, networking, databases — then drilled to sub-service |
| **Cost by Subscription** | Which billing container? Plus the services driving each one |
| **Cost by Resource Group** | Which project or environment? Top spenders first, the long tail rolled into **Others** |
| **Cost by Tag** | However your organization labels things |

## Which one to reach for

**Cost by Cost Group** for anything with a person's name on it — budget conversations, chargeback,
"whose is this?". It's the breakdown that maps to your organization rather than to Azure's.

**Cost by Service** when the total moved and you don't yet know why. Service is usually where a
change is most visible: storage creeping up looks nothing like compute creeping up.

**Cost by Subscription** and **Cost by Resource Group** when you already suspect where the problem is
and want to confirm it.

**Cost by Tag** is only as good as your tagging. If it looks patchy, that's a finding in itself —
see [Unallocated Costs](/docs/using-cloudmonitor/reports/unallocated-costs/).

## They're a starting point, not a limit

Each one is a saved grouping, not a separate dataset. Change the grouping and you're back on the
Ledger, free to stack up to three levels. Nothing is locked.

For a breakdown none of these offers, [The Explorer](/docs/using-cloudmonitor/reports/explorer/) lets
you build your own and save it.

## Filters and sharing

All five honor every global filter and your cost basis. Combine one with the cost group filter and
you get a single team's spend by service, which is usually the exact shape a team lead wants.

Each keeps its own saved views, and the page address follows what you're looking at — so a link you
copy opens on the same breakdown for whoever you send it to.