Rate limiter lab

Token bucket vs leaky bucket vs GCRA, side by side under a burst.

stack

Canvas · Poisson · GCRA

kind

simulator

status

live

Three classic algorithms, one shared arrival stream. Requests arrive Poisson-distributed; each limiter decides accept, reject, or queue. Drag the sliders and watch how each policy handles a burst.

acceptedrejectedqueued (leaky)

offered rate20req/s

limit10req/s

burst10

last 8s

algookrejp95 wait

token bucket00%—

leaky bucket00%—

GCRA00%—

// offered > limit triggers rejects (token/gcra) or queue growth (leaky). burst = tolerance, in requests.

Simulated in-browser at 1× wall time, not a benchmark. Token bucket and GCRA are equivalent in steady state; leaky bucket trades rejects for delay. Algorithms in src/components/lab/rate-limiter/algorithms.ts.

thesis

Poisson-arriving requests, three queuing strategies side-by-side. Tune rate, burst, capacity; watch rejection %, p95 wait, and how each algorithm behaves under load. A working illustration of Little’s Law.

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