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2026-07-29 16:01
REST API

Retry with Backoff

RetryErrorRequestHard
Try Interactive Demo

What you will learn

  • Retry only idempotent methods (GET, PUT, DELETE) — retrying POST may double-charge
  • Use exponential backoff with jitter — synchronized retries create thundering herds
  • Cap retries and fail loud — infinite retries hide upstream outages from monitoring

Description

Implement exponential backoff for transient failures.

Test Scenario

async function fetchWithRetry(url, maxRetries = 3) {
  for (let i = 0; i < maxRetries; i++) {
    const response = await request.get(url);
    if (response.status() !== 503) return response;
    await sleep(Math.pow(2, i) * 1000);
  }
  throw new Error('Max retries exceeded');
}
Endpoint/api/v1/retry

Testing Tips

  • •Retry on 503 Service Unavailable
  • •Use exponential backoff (1s, 2s, 4s)
  • •Set max retry limit
// Playwright API Testing - REST
import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';


test('REST API request', async ({ request }) => {
  const response = await request.get('/api/v1/resource');


  expect(response.ok()).toBeTruthy();
  expect(response.status()).toBe(200);


  const data = await response.json();
  expect(data).toBeDefined();
});

Challenge ID: rest-retry-pattern

2 frameworks available

API Playground

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Endpoint: /api/v1/retry

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