Inactive Network Load Balancer (NLB)

Service Category

Networking

Cloud Provider

AWS

Service Name

AWS ELB

Inefficiency Type

Unused Resource

Explanation

Network Load Balancers that are no longer needed often persist after architecture changes, service decommissioning, or migration projects. When no active TCP connections or traffic flow through the NLB, it still generates hourly operational costs. Identifying and removing these idle resources helps reduce unnecessary networking expenses without affecting service availability.

Relevant Billing Model

Network Load Balancers are billed per hour of operation and per GB of data processed. Inactive NLBs that remain provisioned without traffic continue to incur hourly charges, even when no connections are being handled.

Detection

Identify Network Load Balancers with no active connections or minimal data processing over a defined monitoring window
Confirm there are no registered targets, listener rules, or backend services depending on the NLB
Review networking and security configurations to ensure the load balancer is not being used for future failover or redundancy scenarios
Check tagging and documentation history to assess whether the NLB was tied to a deprecated workload or temporary environment
Validate findings with infrastructure or application teams before initiating removal

Remediation

If confirmed to be inactive, delete the load balancer through the AWS Console, CLI, or API to stop further billing. Where possible, document the reason for decommissioning and update tagging or inventory systems to prevent reaccumulation of unused resources.

Relevant Documentation