The customer is charged for each running virtual machine. As with the Allocation Pool model, the vCloud provider manages resource overcommitments by defining a guaranteed percentage of allocated resources, such as CPU, memory resources, and a maximum number of virtual machines. The cloud provider can specify a maximum virtual CPU speed, or limit. Unlike the allocation and Reservation Pool models, the Pay As You Go model facilitates an unlimited approach to resource consumption within the constraints of the vCloud provider’s physical infrastructure. As with the Allocation Pool model, the Pay As You Go model may consume resources from one or more resource pools, depending on the vCloud provider’s configuration.

Typically, the Pay As You Go model is a good fit for transient and training environments.