Designing a Real-Time Chat Backend with gRPC
Walk through a real-world case study: architecting a scalable real-time chat backend using gRPC bidirectional streaming, fan-out, and presence.
The Case Study
We design a chat backend that must deliver messages instantly to thousands of connected users. gRPC bidirectional streaming is a natural fit for this long-lived, two-way flow.
Defining the Service
The core is a bidi stream: clients send messages and receive others' messages over the same call.
service Chat {
rpc Connect(stream ClientEvent) returns (stream ServerEvent);
}All lessons in this course
- Building High-Throughput Gateways
- Advanced Resilience Patterns
- Future of High-Performance APIs
- Designing a Real-Time Chat Backend with gRPC