Load Balancing: Spreading the Load

What is Load Balancing?

Load balancing distributes incoming traffic across multiple servers for better performance and reliability.

Why Load Balancing?

High Availability

If one server goes down, other servers pick up the slack.

Scalability

Easily add servers as traffic grows.

Better Performance

No single server gets overloaded.

Types of Load Balancers

Hardware

Physical appliances for enterprise environments.

Software

HAProxy, Nginx as a load balancer.

Cloud

Managed solutions from cloud providers.

When Do You Need It?

For high-traffic websites, critical applications, or whenever downtime is unacceptable.