Reverse Proxy vs Cloud Load Balancer

Developers should use a reverse proxy when deploying web applications to distribute traffic across multiple servers, offload SSL encryption, cache static content, and protect against attacks like DDoS meets developers should use cloud load balancers when building scalable web applications, apis, or microservices that require high availability and can handle variable traffic loads. Here's our take.

Reverse Proxy

Nice Pick

Developers should use a reverse proxy when deploying web applications to distribute traffic across multiple servers, offload SSL encryption, cache static content, and protect against attacks like DDoS

Pros

• It's essential for high-availability setups, microservices architectures, and scenarios requiring centralized logging or authentication, such as in cloud deployments or containerized environments
• Related to: nginx, apache-http-server

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

Cloud Load Balancer

Developers should use cloud load balancers when building scalable web applications, APIs, or microservices that require high availability and can handle variable traffic loads

Pros

• They are essential for distributing traffic across multiple instances in auto-scaling groups, enabling zero-downtime deployments through health checks and traffic shifting, and improving performance with features like SSL termination and content-based routing
• Related to: cloud-computing, auto-scaling

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

The Verdict

These tools serve different purposes. Reverse Proxy is a tool while Cloud Load Balancer is a platform. We picked Reverse Proxy based on overall popularity, but your choice depends on what you're building.

The Bottom Line

Reverse Proxy wins

Based on overall popularity. Reverse Proxy is more widely used, but Cloud Load Balancer excels in its own space.