How We “Dogfood” Our Own Stack to Save Millions in Cloud Spend

And What That Means for Government IT Leaders

In today’s cost-constrained environment, government agencies are under pressure to optimize every dollar spent on IT infrastructure. With cloud adoption accelerating across Federal, State, and Local agencies, observability is about more than uptime, it’s about financial accountability.

At Datadog, we go beyond building observability tools – we use them rigorously.

Across our own infrastructure, our engineering teams rely on our own platform to drive performance, reliability, and measurable cost savings. And the results speak for themselves: by combining Cloud Cost Management (CCM) with Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Continuous Profiler, our internal savings now reach into the eight-figure range annually.

That’s not a projection, it’s what we’ve actually uncovered by using Datadog on Datadog.

Visibility Into Spend. Accountability Across Teams.

Here’s how we did it and how government agencies can follow a similar path:

Automated Recommendations with Real Ownership

Engineering teams review CCM’s automated cost optimization recommendations tied to the services they own. These include:

• Idle or underutilized compute
• Inefficient scaling configurations
• Over-provisioned resources

Each team is responsible for acting or justifying exceptions. The result: real accountability, not abstract analysis.

Performance-Based Optimization with Profiling

Beyond infrastructure, we target code-level efficiency. Using Continuous Profiler, engineers quickly identify where CPU or memory cycles are being wasted, then fix inefficiencies. While small improvements may seem minor individually, across hundreds of services they create significant cumulative savings.

A Cultural Shift Toward Cost-Aware Engineering

This is more than just a tooling shift, it’s a mindset. Teams regularly review CCM dashboards during sprint planning. Cost efficiency is prioritized alongside uptime and latency. Cost wins are celebrated, tracked, and operationalized.

A Playbook for Government IT

With fiscal constraints tightening, cloud cost transparency is no longer optional. Building on earlier efforts like OMB’s 2019 Cloud Smart strategy, and newer directives—such as Executive Order 14222, which directs agencies to scrutinize and reduce contract and grant spending, underscores how even modest savings on multi-million-dollar cloud bills can yield meaningful taxpayer value. 

Datadog gives agency CIOs, DevSecOps teams, and procurement leads the tools and  telemetry to:

• Track spend by service, team, or tag
• Link cost and performance metrics
• Take immediate action using real-time insights

Whether you're operating in government cloud environment, and hybrid infrastructure, or just beginning your modernization journey, these practices can help balance mission execution with fiscal responsibility.

Start Saving Today

Explore how Datadog can help your agency align cost, performance, and accountability:

• Explore Datadog Cloud Cost Management
• Watch how Profiling works in production
• Read info on the CCM API documentation

You don’t need to wait for audits or budget mandates. The savings are there. The signal is clear..

See your cloud. Control your cost. Maximize your mission.