Cache Warming
Last Updated: January 9, 2026
When you deploy a new version of your application, your cache often starts from zero.
Your code might be fine. The real issue is that the cache is empty.
Every request becomes a cache miss. Instead of serving responses from memory, your system falls back to the database for almost everything. In minutes, the database is handling 20× its normal load, latency spikes, and you are one incident away from rate limits, timeouts, or an outage.
That surge is the cold cache problem. Cache warming is how you prevent it.
In this chapter, we will explore:
- What is cache warming?
- The cold cache problem
- When you need cache warming
- Warming strategies
- Identifying what to warm
- Best practices for production systems