Thundering Herd

A problem where a large number of clients simultaneously retry or reconnect after a shared failure, overwhelming the server that has just begun recovering. The name comes from the image of a herd of animals stampeding together. Thundering herd is a natural consequence of synchronized retry schedules — all clients back off for the same duration and then hammer the server at the same moment. Jitter, staggered reconnect windows, and circuit breakers are the primary mitigations.