- Only internal communication changes to gRPC; the public API remains HTTP/JSON. Internal messages use a defined schema and protocol buffers instead of JSON, changing transport and encoding overhead.
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| Same eight-vCPU server | Maximum users | App CPU per public request | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monolith | 60,000 | About 0.47 ms | 4:56 6:20 |
| HTTP/JSON microservices | 25,000 | About 1.2 ms | 5:39 6:20 |
| gRPC microservices | 29,000 | About 1.01 ms | 6:46 7:05 |
- gRPC improves capacity and CPU efficiency, but separate processes, separate requests, and dependencies between services remain. Protocol overhead explains only part of the gap.
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