Why it matters

GPU spend is often the largest infrastructure cost. Understanding savings levers matters materially.

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The architecture

Rightsize: use SLMs where possible; L4 instead of H100 for some inference.

Spot instances: 60-90% cheaper; must handle interruption.

GPU cost leversRightsizesmaller GPU + SLMSpot / preemptiblecheap but interruptibleReserved / committedbaseline discountBatching + continuous batching + quantization also cut cost by increasing throughput
Cost strategies.
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How it works end to end

Reserved / committed: 1-3 year commit for 30-60% off.

MIG: share across workloads for higher utilization.

Off-peak: run batch jobs at off-peak hours.

Batching: increase throughput to cut cost per request.