Why Rate Limiting Matters: The Problem We're Solving
Imagine your quiz platform suddenly gets featured on social media. Thousands of students hit your API simultaneously. Without protection, your servers crash, your database gets overwhelmed, and legitimate users can't access the system. Even worse, malicious actors can deliberately flood your endpoints to take down your service.
Rate limiting solves three critical problems:
Resource Protection: Prevents any single user from consuming all server resources
Fair Usage: Ensures equal access for all legitimate users during high traffic
Attack Prevention: Blocks denial-of-service attempts and API abuse
What We're Building Today
Today we're implementing the guardian of your AI Quiz Platform - a sophisticated rate limiting system that protects your APIs from abuse while ensuring fair resource distribution. You'll build tiered rate limiting middleware that treats different users and endpoints with varying levels of protection.
The Critical Need for Rate Limiting
When Netflix launched globally, their APIs received millions of requests per second. Without proper rate limiting, a single misbehaving client could have crashed their entire recommendation system. Your quiz platform faces similar challenges - imagine thousands of students submitting answers simultaneously during a timed exam.
Rate limiting is your system's bouncer. It decides who gets in, how often, and what happens when someone tries to push past the limits.