In serverless computing, a cold start is the additional time the function takes to respond to the first request it gets following a period of inactivity.
When a function is triggered for the first time, the cloud provider needs to allocate resources and set up the execution environment, usually spinning up the micro virtual machine running the function code, and initialising all dependencies. This can cause a delay in response time.
Cold-starts can affect the performance of the application, and result in a poor user-experience.
However, it is important to note that cold starts usually represent a tiny fraction of all invocations for applications with decent traffic.
Explore related concepts
Serverless
Serverless is a cloud computing model that enables developers to build and run applications without managing the infrastructure. It enables developers to focus on writing code and delivering value without worrying about servers, virtual machines, or containers.
Latency
Latency is the delay between a request being made and a response being received. It is a key metric as it directly impacts user experience and system performance.
Scalability
Scalability is the ability of an application to handle an increasing load, such as a growin number of users or requests witout experiencing downtime or performance degradation.