Error Recovery Strategies
Build resilient agentic systems that gracefully handle failures and recover intelligently
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0 / 5 completedCircuit Breaker Pattern
When a service starts failing, retrying every request makes the problem worse. The circuit breaker pattern stops sending requests to failing services, giving them time to recover while preventing cascading failures.
How Circuit Breakers Work
Think of it like an electrical circuit breaker in your home. When too much current flows, the breaker trips to prevent damage. In software, when too many errors occur, the circuit "opens" to prevent overwhelming a failing service.
Three Circuit States
Requests flow through normally. Circuit monitors for failures.
All requests fail immediately without attempting. Protects failing service.
Allow limited requests to test if service has recovered.
Interactive: Circuit Breaker Simulator
Simulate successful and failed requests to see how the circuit breaker responds:
Circuit Status
All requests pass through normally. System is healthy.
Use circuit breakers for external service calls (APIs, databases, third-party services). Don't use them for internal function calls or operations that should always succeed. The goal is to prevent cascading failures, not to hide bugs.