5x faster Edge Functions: V8 isolates to Firecracker MicroVMs
5 hours ago
- Netlify rebuilt its Edge Functions infrastructure using MicroVMs inside its own edge network, achieving 5x faster median latency and 47.4% faster p99 invocations.
- The new architecture uses Firecracker MicroVMs with snapshots and Unikraft technology, enabling warm invocations in ~5-6ms and cold starts in ~9ms on average.
- Key design features include service isolation via separate MicroVMs, rendezvous hashing for request stickiness with overflow to avoid hotspots, and local DNS resolvers on compute nodes.
- Benefits of the migration include npm package support out of beta, the ability to revisit operational limits (50ms CPU, 512MB memory, 20MB code), and compute within Netlify's own network.
- The migration required no changes from users and is already live in production at the same pricing.