System Design · Senior · Question 7 of 75
What is backpressure?
- ✓Correct answer: A signal from a slow consumer to the source: "slow down"
- 2Processing queue messages in reverse order
- 3Compressing data before sending it over a back channel
Explanation
Without backpressure, a fast source overflows the consumer's buffers and memory. Examples: the Streams API in the browser (ReadableStream with a queue), limiting queue size, rejecting requests with 429/503.