The Thundering HerdWhen a server restarts or a network blip occurs, all connected clients disconnect simultaneously. If they all reconnect at once, the TLS handshake and WebSocket upgrade overhead can overwhelm the server before a single message is exchanged.
Jittered ReconnectionThe fix is jittered reconnection on the client side combined with server-side connection rate limiting. Exponential backoff spreads retries: 1s, 2s, 4s, 8s, 16s — each attempt doubles the wait time.
Why Jitter MattersWithout jitter, 5,000 clients all wait exactly 2 seconds and hit the server simultaneously. With jitter (±30% randomness), they spread across a 2–6 second window. The server recovers gracefully instead of collapsing under the reconnect storm.
