gRPC Rollout Checklist

When to Use This Checklist

Use this checklist when rolling out gRPC for inter-service communication. gRPC is a high-performance RPC framework that uses Protocol Buffers for typed contracts and HTTP/2 for transport. Its efficiency comes with operational nuances, including connection-aware load balancing and strict contract management, that this checklist makes explicit before go-live.

How to Use This Checklist

Start with proto contracts in a shared, versioned repository and enforce backward-compatible changes via CI linting, since clients are generated from these definitions. Confirm deadlines, cancellation, and retries are handled so failures stay bounded. Pay special attention to load balancing, because gRPC's long-lived HTTP/2 connections defeat naive layer-4 balancers. Secure traffic with TLS and mutual authentication, and instrument every RPC for tracing and metrics.

What Good Looks Like

A solid gRPC rollout has versioned proto contracts with CI-enforced compatibility, deadlines and cancellation handled on both sides, and retries with backoff for idempotent methods. Traffic is encrypted with mutual TLS, and load balancing accounts for HTTP/2 multiplexing. Each RPC is traced and measured, errors use a consistent status model, and a gateway exists for REST or browser clients. A documented coexistence and rollback plan protects the migration.

Common Pitfalls

The classic gRPC pitfall is load imbalance: HTTP/2 connections pin clients to one backend, overloading it. Breaking proto changes slip through without CI linting and break generated clients. Missing deadlines let calls hang indefinitely. Teams forget browser and REST clients cannot speak gRPC natively and need a gateway. Finally, inconsistent error handling across services confuses callers.

Related Resources

Review gRPC best practices, API-first design, service mesh guidance, the circuit breaker pattern, and distributed tracing best practices.