Create Virtual Tag Rules

7 min readUpdated June 2026

Why virtual tags

Provider tags are rarely complete, and waiting for perfect tagging means waiting forever. Virtual tags let you define business dimensions inside Cloptima from the metadata you already have — no changes to provider-side tags or infrastructure.

Define your dimensions

Create the dimensions your organization allocates by.

Team, application, environment, owner
Cost center, project
Namespace and service (for Kubernetes)

Write and preview rules

Build rules that map resources to a dimension from source tags, Kubernetes labels, namespaces, account, or naming conventions. Preview which resources each rule matches and why, so attribution is auditable rather than a black box.

Virtual tags are applied inside Cloptima only — your provider-side tags and infrastructure are never modified.

Allocate shared costs

Distribute pooled costs — platform, network, monitoring, CI/CD — proportionally across teams by usage, headcount, or custom weights, so shared infrastructure isn't left unattributed.

Publish showback or chargeback

Start with showback to build trust in the numbers, isolate any unattributed spend, then move to chargeback once ownership is solid.