Is Amazon Cognito free for authentication?

No — there's no free plan, but no monthly fee either: you pay for what you use (Lite: monthly active users $0.0055 per MAU).

How much does Amazon Cognito cost for authentication?

Charged per monthly active user: the first 10,000 direct or social sign-in MAUs per account are free on Lite and Essentials, then $0.0055 per MAU on Lite ($0.0046 above 100k) or $0.015 on Essentials. At list prices: monthly active users 1k MAU: $0/month (Lite); monthly active users 10k MAU: $0/month (Lite); monthly active users 250k MAU: $1,185/month (Lite).

Amazon Cognito pricing

How Amazon Cognito charges, what to know before you commit, and what you'd pay at your usage — next to what the alternatives would cost for the same thing.

How it charges

Checked 2026-10-03 on aws.amazon.com ↗ · USD, list prices

In short

Charged per monthly active user: the first 10,000 direct or social sign-in MAUs per account are free on Lite and Essentials, then $0.0055 per MAU on Lite ($0.0046 above 100k) or $0.015 on Essentials.

Free plan: Yes
Cheapest paid plan: $495/mo
Side project: $0/mo Lite
Growing: $0/mo Lite
Scaling: $1,185/mo Lite

What the model leaves out

User pools with direct and social sign-in. 10,000 MAU free per account (Lite and Essentials). Lite is graduated — $0.0055 to 100k, $0.0046 beyond (one plan per tier). Essentials adds passkeys, managed login and more. Plus is $0.02 per MAU with no free tier. SAML/OIDC federated users are $0.015 per MAU after 50 free, on every tier.

Before you commit

The 10,000 free MAUs are per AWS account or organization, shared by all your user pools, and the Plus tier has no free tier.
Users who sign in through SAML or OIDC federation get only 50 free MAUs, then $0.015 each, on every tier.
A user counts as active for any identity operation in the month, including token refresh, sign-out or an admin update, not just sign-in.
SMS messages (via Amazon SNS) and verification emails (via Amazon SES) are billed separately on those services.