Reliability

Retry Amplification

Retries multiplying across layers: three layers each retrying twice turns one request into 27.

Why interviewers ask about it

The mechanism behind most cascading failures. Retry at one layer only, with backoff and full jitter.

Capping retries as a fraction of total traffic rather than as a fixed count per request.

This term is part of the free System Design interview preparation module - browse the full glossary for every definition.