# Budgets
Source: https://docs.infraista.com/en/billing/budgets



A budget is a spending target with alerts. You hear early, from what you've spent and from the
period-end forecast. Budgets never block billing or stop servers.

<Shot name="billing/budgets" alt="The Budgets page with a monthly budget for all spend and one for the Website project" />

## Create a budget [#create-a-budget]

1. Go to **Account › Budgets** and select **Create budget**.
2. **What to watch**: **All spend**, one **Project**, or one **Product** (like Instances).
3. **Period and amount**: **Monthly**, **Quarterly** or **Yearly**, and the &#x2A;*Budget amount (USD)**. The
   page suggests an amount from your forecast plus 10%. The period resets automatically.
4. **Alert thresholds**: up to 6, each a percentage of **actual spend** or of the **forecast**.
5. **Recipients**: members, plus up to 10 other email addresses.
6. Give it a **Budget name** and save.

<Shot name="billing/new-budget" alt="The Create a budget page: what to watch, period and amount, alert thresholds, recipients and a preview" />

## How alerts work [#how-alerts-work]

* Alerts on **actual spend** fire once when the period's cost so far passes a threshold, such as 50% or
  80%.
* Alerts on the **forecast** fire as soon as the period-end forecast passes a threshold, so you hear
  about it weeks earlier.
* Budgets are checked every hour. Each threshold alerts once per period.

Alerts are emailed to the recipients, and members also see them under the bell. Pause a budget's alerts
with its switch, or **Edit** and **Delete** it.

## Related [#related]

* [Usage and Cost Explorer](/en/billing/usage-and-cost-explorer)