By Aijaz Alam
How much cloud spending is wasted?
Cloud buyers estimate that 29% of their cloud spend is wasted, by their own reckoning rather than a measurement, in Flexera's 2026 State of the Cloud survey of more than 750 cloud decision-makers (18 March 2026). It is the first rise in five years, after a fall from 32% in 2022 to 27% in 2024 and 2025; Flexera links it to AI workloads.
- 29%Cloud spend wasted, by respondents' own estimateFlexera State of the Cloud 2026
- 32%The high, in the 2022 reportFlexera State of the Cloud 2022
- 76%Large enterprises spending over $5 million a month on cloudFlexera State of the Cloud 2026
- 81%Respondents whose organization uses generative AIFlexera State of the Cloud 2026
- 24%Wasted software spend in the public cloudFlexera State of the Cloud 2024 and 2025
The numbers
The full breakdown
Cloud spend and AI in Flexera's 2026 State of the Cloud survey
| Measure | Share |
|---|---|
| Large enterprises spending over $5 million a month on cloud services | 76% |
| Respondents using generative AI (72% a year earlier, 47% in 2024) | 81% |
| Respondents using generative AI extensively (36% a year earlier) | 45% |
| Say managing cloud spend is a top challenge | 85% |
| Have established FinOps teams | 63% |
| Operate a Cloud Center of Excellence | 71% |
| Large enterprises establishing dedicated AI governance teams or leaders | 47% |
Flexera press release, 18 Mar 2026; global survey of more than 750 cloud decision-makers and users. Vendor survey; Flexera sells cloud cost management software.
Over time
Estimated wasted cloud spend, by Flexera State of the Cloud report
| Report | Estimated wasted cloud spend | Respondents |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 30% | Not given (2021 report not read) |
| 2022 | 32% | 753 |
| 2023 | 28% | 750 |
| 2024 | 27% | 753 |
| 2025 | 27% | 759 |
| 2026 | 29% | More than 750 |
Respondents' own estimate of the share of their cloud spend that is wasted; the 2024 and 2025 reports describe it as spend on IaaS and PaaS. Each report is published early in the year. The 2021 figure is as stated in the 2022 report ("up from 30 percent last year"); the 2021 report itself was not read. Flexera's 2025 report puts the 32% high "four years ago", its 2024 report "in 2022"; the 2022 report gives 32%.
Why sources differ
Same question, different answers
| Number | When | Who measured | Why it differs |
|---|---|---|---|
| 29% | 2026 report | Flexera State of the Cloud | Self-estimate by cloud decision-makers of wasted cloud spend, mostly infrastructure and platform (IaaS and PaaS). |
| 24% | 2025 report | Flexera State of the Cloud | Self-estimate of wasted software spend in the public cloud, a separate question. |
| 36% of licenses unused | 2025 data | Zylo SaaS Management Index 2026 | Share of SaaS licenses unused against recommended use levels, measured from customer data, not a share of dollars. |
| 32% | 2022 report | Flexera State of the Cloud | The highest self-estimate in the series. |
All the waste figures here come from companies that sell tools to cut cloud or SaaS costs, so read them as indications, not measurements. Flexera's 29% is what cloud decision-makers think their organization wastes; Flexera itself said in its 2022 report that waste is likely even higher, because many organizations tend to underestimate it. The question covers infrastructure and platform spend, while a separate question on software licenses in the public cloud gives 24%.
Zylo's 36% is a different kind of number: a share of SaaS licenses that go unused, measured from its customers' usage data against recommended use levels. A license left unused for part of the year is not the same as a third of the money lost, and Zylo's customers are firms large enough to buy a SaaS management tool.
No government statistic measures cloud waste. The trend within one survey is more useful than the level: Flexera's estimate fell from 32% to 27% as FinOps teams spread, and rose again to 29% as AI workloads grew.
What it means
How to use these numbers
By their own estimate, organizations waste a bit under a third of what they spend on cloud infrastructure. That share had been falling for years as companies set up FinOps teams to track spend, and 63% now have one. The 2026 rise to 29% is small, but Flexera links it to surging cloud-based AI workloads.
The sums are large: 76% of large enterprises in the survey spend more than $5 million a month on cloud services, so each point of waste is real money. For a small business the same habits apply at a smaller scale: switch off unused instances and storage, use the provider's committed-use discounts where workloads are steady, and check who still uses each SaaS seat.
For journalists: quote 29% as a self-estimate from a vendor survey of more than 750 cloud decision-makers, not as a measured share of global cloud spend.
Method and sources
How it was measured
Method
- Publisher
- Flexera, State of the Cloud Report 2026 (press release, 18 March 2026), and the 2022 to 2025 reports
- Sample
- Global survey of more than 750 cloud decision-makers and users each year (753 in 2022 and 2024, 750 in 2023, 759 in 2025)
- Question
- What's your estimated wasted cloud spend? (self-estimate)
- Limits
- Vendor survey of a self-selected panel, mostly larger organizations; waste is the respondents' own estimate, not a measurement
- Checked at source
- 31 Oct 2026: the 2026 press release on flexera.com and the 2022 to 2025 report PDFs on resources.flexera.com
- Next release
- Flexera publishes the report each spring
- Last changed
- 31 Oct 2026
- Data files
- CSV · JSON (stable links)
Sources
- State of the Cloud Report, Flexera Vendor data
- SaaS Management Index, Zylo Vendor data
Cite this page
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FAQ
More questions people ask
Is the 29% measured or estimated?
Estimated. Flexera asks cloud decision-makers what share of their cloud spend they think is wasted; it does not measure their bills.
Why did cloud waste go up in 2026?
Flexera says surging cloud-based AI workloads caused the increase, the first in five years, after the estimate had fallen from 32% (2022 report) to 27% (2024 and 2025).
How much do large companies spend on the cloud?
In Flexera's 2026 survey, 76% of large enterprises spent more than $5 million a month on cloud services.
How much SaaS is wasted?
Flexera's 2025 report put wasted software spend in the public cloud at 24%, and Zylo's customers left 36% of their SaaS licenses unused on average in 2025.
Every number on this page was checked at its original source (Flexera, Zylo). Free to cite with a link to this page.