How to Avoid Route 53 $0.50 / Month Charge per Hosting Zone using Free CloudFront Distribution

Source: Dev.to

Background

AWS Route 53 charges US $0.50 per hosted zone per month. Even when you use other AWS services sparingly, this fixed cost can add up quickly if you manage multiple domains—especially when you have separate AWS accounts for development, UAT, and production, each requiring its own hosted zone.

Using a Free CloudFront Distribution

AWS recently introduced flat‑rate pricing for CloudFront distributions. One of the services included in the free‑tier plan is a Route 53 hosted zone, allowing you to reduce the cost of a hosted zone to $0.00.

You don’t need to modify your existing applications. Simply create a new CloudFront distribution and point it to any subdomain in the hosted zone you want to offset.

Step‑by‑Step Guide

1. Open CloudFront in the AWS Console → Distributions.

2. Click Create Distribution.

3. Select the Free plan and click Next.

   

4. Fill in a name and description.

   • Domain: provide a subdomain of the hosted zone you want to offset (e.g., offset.mydomain.com if your domain is mydomain.com).

5. After confirming the settings, you should see a success screen like this:

   

6. Origin: choose Other and provide any domain/path you like (e.g., point back to your main domain).

7. Enable rate limiting on the Security page and click Next.

TLS Certificate

• When prompted to select a certificate, create a new one rather than reusing an existing certificate. This avoids interfering with other setups.

8. Finish creating the distribution.

9. Once the distribution is active, go to Billing → Manage plan.

   

10. Look for the line “Route 53 DNS: [your hosted zone domain]”. If it appears, the $0.50 monthly charge for that hosted zone is eliminated.

    

Notes & Limitations

• Existing CloudFront distributions can be switched to the flat‑rate plan, but many features (e.g., advanced security, custom SSL, etc.) are not covered by the free tier. When such features are enabled, the Free plan option will be grayed out.

  

• In most cases, creating a new distribution under a different sub‑domain is the simplest approach.

Additional Resources

• Next.js starter templates (free):
  • Next.js + Tailwind
  • Next.js + Bootstrap
  • Server‑Side Rendering

If you’d like these templates updated to use the flat‑rate CloudFront distribution, please raise an issue on GitHub.