Why Is My Datadog Bill So High: Custom Metrics

How to fix it

Try these in order — the most common fix is first.

1. 1. Find the top spenders

   Copy steps
   1. Open Metrics > Volume
   2. Review top custom metrics and spiking cardinality tag keys
   Did this fix it? Yes No

2. 2. Apply Metrics without Limits

   Copy steps
   1. Open the metric in Metrics Summary > Configure Tags
   2. Keep an allowlist of queryable tags
   Did this fix it? Yes No

3. 3. Remove unused metrics

   1. Use Related Assets to find metrics not on any dashboard or monitor
   Did this fix it? Yes No

4. 4. Set usage alerts

   Copy steps
   1. Create monitors on estimated usage metrics
   2. Use Usage Attribution to assign costs to teams
   Did this fix it? Yes No

Symptoms

Sudden bill increase, custom metrics count spikes.

Why it happens

• High-cardinality tags (pod, user, request IDs)
• OpenTelemetry metrics counted as custom
• Kubernetes exporters generating tens of thousands of metrics

This guide also covers

• why is datadog so expensive
• datadog custom metrics cost
• datadog bill too high

Other Datadog errors

• How to Cancel Datadog Subscription
• Datadog Agent Not Reporting Metrics or Host Missing
• Datadog Duplicate Hosts After AWS Integration
• Datadog Logs Not Showing in Log Explorer
• Datadog APM Traces Not Showing Up
• Datadog Agent High CPU or Memory Usage
• Datadog Monitor No Data Alerts Not Working
• Datadog Agent 403 API Key Invalid in Kubernetes