What is an API gateway and do I need one?
A gateway (Nginx, Kong, or a custom Express app) sits in front of your services and routes requests to the right one. The client does not see the split. You need one once you have more than one service.
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More FAQs in Node.js Microservices Roadmap: Step by Step
Build a clean monolith. Routes, controllers, models, services, middlewares, utils. Keep modules decoupled and structure data per module. This is your foundation for splitting later.
A single request can hit multiple services. Without distributed tracing (Jaeger, Zipkin), you cannot see where time is spent or where errors come from. You cannot debug what you cannot see.
When you have async workflows or multiple services need to react to the same event. A broker (Kafka, RabbitMQ, SQS) decouples services and handles bursts.
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