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Description

This policy identifies Google GCE Instances that appear to be underutilized. By default, an instance is considered underutilized if its average CPU utilization remains below 40% and its maximum CPU utilization does not exceed 50% over a 14-day evaluation period.

Rationale​

Underutilized instances contribute to unnecessary cloud expenditure. By identifying and rightsizing these resources, organizations can optimize their infrastructure and achieve cost savings without negatively affecting application performance.

Impact​

Resizing an instance may require the instance to be stopped and restarted, resulting in a brief downtime.

Audit​

This policy evaluates a Google GCE Instance based on its 14-day performance metrics.

The Instance is marked as INCOMPLIANT if all the following criteria are met:

  • CPU Utilization, Average, % field is less than 40%.
  • CPU Utilization, Max, % field is less than 50%.

The Instance is marked as INAPPLICABLE if it is not currently running, it has been running for less than 14 days, or this instance is idle and evaluated by the Google GCE Instance is idle policy.

The Instance is marked as UNDETERMINED if any of the evaluated metrics are empty, indicating insufficient data in the CMDB to assess whether the instance is underutilized.