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API Timeout Strategies

Pick sensible timeouts

Designing timeouts means setting per-endpoint/client time limits based on downstream SLAs and budgets, coordinating with retries and circuit breakers so users get fast failures instead of hanging requests.

Set Budgets

Align timeouts to downstream SLAs and overall user latency goals.

Coordinate Retries

Shorten timeouts when retrying; cap total time and attempts.

Fail Fast

Combine with circuit breakers and clear errors for clients.

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