Failover and Standby Systems
Failover is the ability for a backup system to take over automatically when the main one fails, ideally with little or no interruption. It is how the most resilient services stay online through hardware failures.
This article explains how failover works and when it is worth the extra cost of running standby systems.
How Failover Works
A standby system runs alongside the live one. If the live system stops responding, traffic is redirected to the standby.
- Monitoring constantly checks the live system's health.
- On failure, traffic is switched to the standby.
- The standby serves users while the original is fixed.
- Service returns to normal once the issue is resolved.
Is It Worth It for You?
Automatic failover is invaluable when even short downtime is costly. For less critical sites, a tested manual restore is often a more sensible spend.
| Setup | Downtime on failure | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| No standby | Hours | Lowest |
| Manual standby | Minutes to hours | Medium |
| Automatic failover | Seconds | Highest |
If you need a hand with any of this, your Progressive Robot delivery team is ready to help. Raise a ticket from the Support area of your client portal or speak to your account manager and we will guide you through the next steps.