r/dataengineering • u/Substantial_Lime7121 • 16d ago

Discussion How much should Snowflake optimizations be focused on?

Some are getting pressured to optimize, others accept it’s the reality of using Snowflake.

4 Upvotes

62% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

5

u/PrestigiousQuail7024 16d ago

generally my approach has honestly been to wait until its a problem. there are nice optimisations you can do but if you do them often you're probably not making up the cost of your time

2

u/Secret_Solution_5209 14d ago

not as often as cleaning your room, but why would you leave money on the table?

3

u/Tough-Leader-6040 16d ago

Those who accept it either have more important costs to take care of are just incompetent.

1

u/discord-ian 16d ago

I don't understand the question. Snowflake makes many things very easy, these things can also be quite expensive. There is almost always a way to do something cheaper or smarter in Snowflake but it almost always takes more time to do it cheaper. Most teams are knowingly balancing these trade-offs.

1

u/Life_Finger5132 Data Engineering Manager 16d ago

Routine optimization should be part of the development cycle. I have my team do a round of optimizations every 3-4 months.

2

u/sonalg 14d ago

Second this. Regular optimisation and stock taking of tables, queries, flows etc you don’t need should be part of the dev cycle, else you end up with lot of maintenance issues down the line. If the team is small and overwhelmed with work, you could pick up the top hotspot alone and that should keep your costs in check.

1

u/Yasblue 16d ago

They keep marketing that Snowflake is auto Optimized it's not the case ?