Cloud Log Retention Compliance Cost

Get an instant read on what compliance-driven log retention really costs. Supply your average daily ingest, how long regulators require you to retain events, and your storage pricing. Add compression assumptions and an archive tier to see the blended monthly bill you need to budget for SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI, or SEC audits.

Average gigabytes of logs landing in your platform each day.
Number of days you must keep searchable or archived log data.
On-demand rate for your logging tier per gigabyte-month.
Defaults to 20%. Enter the storage reduction achieved via compression or dedupe.
Defaults to 25%. Share of retained logs you push to a lower-cost archive after ingestion.
Defaults to $0.012. Enter your archive or object storage pricing per GB-month.

Budgeting estimate only—validate pricing tables, tier transitions, and retrieval costs with your cloud provider or SIEM vendor before committing spend.

Examples

  • 180 GB/day, 90-day retention, $0.23 primary rate, 25% compression, 40% archived at $0.015 ⇒ $1,749.60 USD/month
  • 45 GB/day, 30-day retention, $0.19 rate, no compression, no cold tier ⇒ $256.50 USD/month

FAQ

How should I account for retrieval or rehydration fees?

This calculator isolates standing storage cost. Add your provider's per-GB retrieval charge separately if you regularly rehydrate cold logs for investigations.

Can I model tiered pricing?

Run the tool for each pricing band and sum the outputs, or use a weighted average rate that reflects how much data falls into each tier.

What if I mirror logs across regions?

Double the daily ingest input or adjust the storage rate to reflect the multi-region uplift so the result captures resilience requirements alongside compliance.

Additional Information

  • Effective volume equals daily ingest × retention days × (1 − compression).
  • Cold tier share pushes data into a cheaper archive while the remainder stays on the primary logging tier.
  • Multiply the result by 12 for an annual compliance storage forecast to inform budgets and SOC attestation packets.

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