Making Sense of Media Costs as You Scale
As a growing product team, we keep shipping features that rely heavily on images and video, but the pricing models behind media delivery feel opaque. How do teams usually balance performance, reliability, and cost without locking themselves into tools that quietly become too expensive as traffic grows?
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Most teams learn the hard way that media infrastructure scales differently than core app services. The trick is to evaluate vendors not just on raw performance, but on pricing transparency, automation, and how well they fit real usage patterns. Smart teams revisit contracts regularly, track asset usage closely, and look for small efficiencies that add up over time - sometimes even leveraging programs like a Cloudinary Discount as part of a broader cost-optimization mindset rather than a one-off win.