# Circuit Breaker Pattern

> A design pattern that stops calling a dependency after repeated failures and probes it again after a wait.

Record: `architecture:circuit-breaker-pattern`
Kind: pattern
Layer: [Correctness Core](https://banes-lab.com/records/layer/correctness-core.md)
Severity: contextual
Scope: dependency call, service
Canonical: https://banes-lab.com/ontology#architecture-circuit-breaker-pattern

Listed in [Architecture principles](https://banes-lab.com/api/records/architecture.md), after [Timeout Pattern](https://banes-lab.com/records/architecture/timeout-pattern.md) and before [Bulkhead Pattern](https://banes-lab.com/records/architecture/bulkhead-pattern.md).

## Repair

- Refactored by: Add Circuit Breaker
- Detected by: high failure dependency calls without breaker
- Violated by: continuing calls to failing dependency
- Measured by: breaker trip rate, downstream error rate
- Enforced by: [resilience policy](https://banes-lab.com/records/algorithms/resilience-policy.md)

## Requires

- [Failure Threshold](https://banes-lab.com/records/lexicon/failure-threshold.md)
- [Fallback](https://banes-lab.com/records/lexicon/fallback.md)

## Reinforces

- [Fault Tolerance](https://banes-lab.com/records/architecture/fault-tolerance.md)
- [Backpressure](https://banes-lab.com/records/architecture/backpressure.md)

## Enables

- [Cascading Failure Prevention](https://banes-lab.com/records/lexicon/cascading-failure-prevention.md)

## Conflicts with

- [Unbounded Retry](https://banes-lab.com/records/lexicon/unbounded-retry.md)
- [Retry Storm](https://banes-lab.com/records/architecture/retry-storm.md)

## In tension with

- [Availability of Degraded Dependency](https://banes-lab.com/records/lexicon/availability-of-degraded-dependency.md)

## Tensions

- [Circuit Breaker Pattern / Availability of Degraded Dependency](https://banes-lab.com/records/tension/availability-of-degraded-dependency-circuit-breaker-pattern.md)

## Severity

- [contextual](https://banes-lab.com/records/vocabulary/severity-contextual.md)

## Category

- [Error Handling / Resilience](https://banes-lab.com/records/architecture-category/error-handling-resilience.md)

## Linked from

- [Anti-patterns](https://banes-lab.com/ontology/principles/architecture-category-anti-patterns.md)
- [Error Handling / Resilience](https://banes-lab.com/ontology/principles/architecture-category-error-handling-resilience.md)
- [Core Vocabulary](https://banes-lab.com/ontology/lexicon/lexicon-category-core-vocabulary.md)
- [Error Handling / Resilience](https://banes-lab.com/ontology/lexicon/lexicon-category-error-handling-resilience.md)
- [Severity levels](https://banes-lab.com/ontology/schema/the-vocabulary-severity.md)
- [The resolutions](https://banes-lab.com/ontology/schema/the-resolutions.md)