What are the estimated cloud costs for launching a 30-hour video course?

Consider using a platform like Teachable instead of managing everything yourself. It can significantly simplify the process and save you from the technical headaches of self-hosting.

Data egress costs can quickly add up, especially with video streaming. If your total video size is around 15GB for 30 hours (assuming 100 students watch it completely once), you'll be looking at about 1.5TB of data egress. In regions like Southeast Asia, that could cost around $150 to $200, so be sure to factor that in!

With Amazon CloudFront, you can get a plan that includes 50GB of S3 storage and 50TB of data transfer out for about $15/month. If you go this route, compute costs can be quite low—potentially around $20/month total. However, just ensure that your delivery method is optimized for videos. Also, using a .edu email might offer some additional free or discounted options.

Before estimating costs, you'll need to define your system architecture. One of the biggest factors is how you plan to stream the videos to your students. If you use a Content Delivery Network (CDN) like CloudFront or CloudFlare, that will affect your costs too. Keep in mind that AWS charges for data transfer, which is a significant factor when sending video out to your students alongside the storage expenses.

To get a clearer picture of your potential costs, try using the AWS Pricing Calculator. Here’s a link to their calculator and additional resources for guidance: https://go.aws/3LutuXE. It has everything you need to get started!