Fine-Tuning Large Language Models on AWS: Cost vs Performance

Rizqi Mulki

9 min read

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Oct 7, 2025

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Fine-tuning large language models (LLMs) on AWS can cost anywhere from $50 to $50,000+ depending on the approach. The difference between burning through budgets and achieving cost-efficient results lies in understanding the tradeoffs between instance types, optimization techniques, and AWS service selection.

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The Cost Reality of LLM Fine-Tuning

Training costs vary dramatically based on model size, dataset, and infrastructure choices. Here’s what teams actually spend:

Small-scale fine-tuning (7B parameters)

• Dataset: 10,000 examples
• Instance: ml.g5.2xlarge
• Duration: 4–6 hours
• Cost: $60–90

Medium-scale fine-tuning (13B parameters)

• Dataset: 50,000 examples
• Instance: ml.p4d.24xlarge
• Duration: 12–24 hours
• Cost: $384–768

Large-scale fine-tuning (70B parameters)

• Dataset: 100,000+ examples
• Instance: Multiple p4d.24xlarge
• Duration: 2–7 days
• Cost: $1,536–22,400