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The FinOps Framework has come a long way.
In 2024, it underwent a major overhaul — the most significant revision since its inception. That update simplified the model, introduced a new persona-based approach, and reorganized capabilities to better reflect how FinOps is actually practiced in the real world.
This year’s 2025 update builds on that foundation with practical improvements shaped by feedback from real practitioners. In this article, we’ll break down the most impactful changes and why they matter.
You can now onboard your AWS accounts to nOps and EKS clusters to nOps Compute Copilot with Terraform. This integration enables you to optimize cloud costs while managing both nOps and AWS resource lifecycles with CI/CD pipelines, to automatically deploy the necessary infrastructure and communicate securely with the platform.
1. FinOps is not just about cloud anymore — it includes data centers, SaaS and GenAI
The 2025 framework formally expands FinOps beyond public cloud to cover a broader category of “technology spend” — including data centers, SaaS applications like Snowflake and Salesforce, and emerging compute-heavy workloads like GenAI.
This evolution acknowledges that many orgs are managing decentralized, high-variability spending outside traditional IaaS. If you’re just focusing on cloud, you’re missing out on governance (visibility, accountability, optimization…) on a large portion of your costs.
In line with these principles, FinOps domains and capabilities were renamed to remove the word “cloud” and reflect this expanded scope (e.g., “Optimize Cloud Usage and Cost” → “Optimize Usage and Cost”).
2. The introduction of “Scopes” allows modular FinOps for different tech domains
Think of it as modular FinOps. Instead of forcing every team into a one-size-fits-all model, scopes allow organizations to maintain consistent financial governance while flexing for wildly different spend patterns. A GenAI model consuming GPU hours doesn’t behave like a web app on EC2—or a SaaS subscription, for that matter. But all three still need to be tracked, allocated, and optimized. Scopes provide a common language to do that, while acknowledging the nuances of each tech environment.
That flexibility is key for organizations adopting Kubernetes, Snowflake, OpenAI, or other technology-related spending where usage patterns are wildly different from traditional cloud infrastructure, but principles of financial governance must remain consistent.
3. The FinOps Definition & Principles were updated for the first time since 2019
For the first time since 2019, the FinOps Principles have been revised. Specifically, language changes shift the emphasis from cloud-specific decisions to broader technology decisions driven by business value, and from cloud ownership to technology usage ownership across the organization. Additionally, principles now explicitly highlight the need for accuracy in FinOps data and reframe FinOps enablement from being driven by a centralized team to being centrally enabled, reinforcing the flexible and distributed nature of modern FinOps practices.
4. New supporting materials and templates help teams scale FinOps faster
To complement the Framework 2025 updates, the FinOps Foundation introduced new supporting materials aimed at helping organizations scale FinOps internally.
The new materials include practical guides, example Scopes templates, and refined capability definitions to support clearer alignment between business strategy, technology priorities, and financial governance. Sandardized frameworks and templates help teams who might not be FinOps experts quickly adapt and apply key practices like data ingestion, allocation, and visibility.
5. Persona-Driven Views expanded
6. Future-proofing the FinOps Framework
This framework is designed to scale and evolve with new tech that we can’t fully predict yet. The introduction of Scopes gives FinOps the structural flexibility to adapt to future technologies — whether that’s AI agents, quantum computing, or something else entirely. By decoupling FinOps practices from any one environment, the 2025 Framework is built to last.
To support this evolution, the FinOps Foundation is also exploring a Cloud+ Practitioner certification.The rise of Cloud+ roles means practitioners now need to master multi-environment cost tradeoffs — not just cloud, but SaaS, data center, licensing, and AI workloads. To reflect this shift, the FinOps Foundation is exploring a Cloud+ Practitioner certification to define the skill sets needed to manage financial operations across these domains.
Want more detail on these changes? You can watch full video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8TkiIt2sN4
FinOps on nOps
nOps is a purpose-built FinOps platform with full automation across the Inform, Optimize, and Operate phases, to help organizations reduce costs by up to 60%.
Key FinOps capabilities include:
- Business Contexts: get control of your cloud, AI, data, 3rd party tool costs with FinOps visibility features: automated dashboards, reports, cost allocation, tagging, budgets
- Commitment Management: The only FinOps solution with a 100% utilization guarantee for Reserved Instances and Savings Plans—fully automated purchasing, modification, and rebalancing.
- nOps Essentials: automate time-consuming FinOps optimization tasks like pausing idle resources, scheduling resources, optimizing storage, etc.
You can book a demo to try out these G2 5-star rated features with your own AWS account.
nOps was recently ranked #1 with five stars in G2’s cloud cost management category, and we optimize $2 billion in cloud spend for our FinOps customers.
