What benefits do microservices offer?

You already know what microservices are, right? I've already covered it in the previous post on IH. So if you are new here, check it to understand microservices benefits better.

Let's start with some statistics. According to the gathered insights, professionals state that they see improvements from microservices across many areas of their business.

30% higher customer satisfaction/retention
29% Better security of company/customer data. Faster time to market/responding to changes in the marketplace
28% Improved application quality/performance
27% Greater flexibility to scale resources up or down
26% Improved employee productivity. Improved application security

Microservices architecture wouldn't be so popular if it didn't bring so many benefits for businesses. In 2021 IBM Market Development & Insights conducted a survey, during which more than 1,200 IT executives, developer executives, and software engineers from large and mid-sized companies that are currently using a microservices approach were interviewed, as well as non-users who are only planning to adopt MSA.

So, what are the benefits?

Improved scalability

One of the key benefits the microservices offer is their ability to be scaled horizontally easily, which is crucial for applications where scalability is a top priority. Since the services are separated from each other, each has its dedicated resources. Hence, in case of an unpredictable system load caused by, for instance, increased user traffic, the entire system won't be affected, unlike if it's a monolithic application.

Accelerated time to market

The ability to help businesses speed up their deployment cycles is another benefit that microservices provide. Since development teams work on different microservices separately, companies can implement and deploy new functionality faster, as well as update older components. For instance, Uber decided to shift from a monolithic architecture to microservices since they faced multiple operational issues (i.e., risky deployments, poor scalability, slow functionality updating) as soon as the company started growing rapidly.

Better fault tolerance

When it comes to monolithic architecture, a failure of a certain element can affect the entire system. However, in the case of microservices, businesses can avoid cascading failures since if one component fails, the rest of the system will most likely remain intact because the services run independently. As a result, the identification of a root problem becomes faster, and the entire system doesn't have to be redeployed to make changes and fix the issue, which eventually leads to a reduction in downtime.

Versatility of available tools to implement microservices

Thanks to the way the microservices are built, engineering teams that work on each service can assemble the technology stack that will work best for the particular component. Such a technology-agnostic approach provides businesses with greater flexibility and the ability to avoid vendor or technology lock-in.

If you find this post interesting, check this article to learn more about microservices.

https://www.aimprosoft.com/blog/java-framework-for-microservices/