A Case Study: Cutting API Response Times by 60% with Edge Caching

A read-heavy public API was struggling under traffic spikes. This case study documents the migration to an edge-cached architecture. Approach: - Classified endpoints by mutability and set per-route TTLs. - Introduced stale-while-revalidate for the hottest read paths. - Kept writes server-side with targeted cache invalidation. Result: p95 latency dropped 60%, origin load fell by two-thirds, and monthly egress cost decreased measurably. The invalidation strategy and pitfalls are documented in full.