Load Balancer vs Client-Side Load Balancing

Developers should use load balancers when building scalable web applications, APIs, or microservices that require high availability and fault tolerance, such as e-commerce sites, streaming platforms, or cloud-based services meets developers should learn and use client-side load balancing when building distributed systems, especially microservices, to enhance fault tolerance and reduce latency by avoiding an extra hop to a central load balancer. Here's our take.

Load Balancer

Nice Pick

Developers should use load balancers when building scalable web applications, APIs, or microservices that require high availability and fault tolerance, such as e-commerce sites, streaming platforms, or cloud-based services

Pros

• They are crucial for distributing traffic during peak loads, enabling zero-downtime deployments through rolling updates, and improving response times by reducing server bottlenecks
• Related to: reverse-proxy, high-availability

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

Client-Side Load Balancing

Developers should learn and use client-side load balancing when building distributed systems, especially microservices, to enhance fault tolerance and reduce latency by avoiding an extra hop to a central load balancer

Pros

• It is particularly useful in cloud-native environments with dynamic service discovery (e
• Related to: microservices, service-discovery

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

The Verdict

These tools serve different purposes. Load Balancer is a tool while Client-Side Load Balancing is a concept. We picked Load Balancer based on overall popularity, but your choice depends on what you're building.

The Bottom Line

Load Balancer wins

Based on overall popularity. Load Balancer is more widely used, but Client-Side Load Balancing excels in its own space.