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WebSocket Load Balancing

Medium

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WebSockets break standard load balancing

HTTP load balancing is simple: each request is independent, any server can handle it. WebSockets are different — a connection is persistent and stateful. Once a client's WebSocket upgrades on Server 1, all subsequent frames for that connection must go to Server 1.

This creates two problems: sticky routing (ensuring reconnects hit the same server) and fan-out (broadcasting to clients distributed across multiple servers).

Packets in motion — click to inspect:

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