{"id":14798,"date":"2017-05-09T14:00:14","date_gmt":"2017-05-09T14:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/microservices\/"},"modified":"2025-01-16T16:25:38","modified_gmt":"2025-01-16T16:25:38","slug":"microservices","status":"publish","type":"definition","link":"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/microservices","title":{"rendered":"Microservices"},"content":{"rendered":"

What Are Microservices?<\/span><\/h2>\n

A microservice is a modular software<\/a> component that does one defined job. Microservices, which have become the default architecture for software development<\/a>, can run as a process on an application server<\/a>, virtual machines<\/a> (VMs), or, more commonly, containers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Each microservice can be explained as a mini-application \u2013 small, autonomous<\/a> services that work together. Each is an independently deployable service with its own business logic and adapters for carrying out functions, such as database<\/a> access and messaging. The resulting application will have small, loosely coupled<\/a> components that communicate with each other using lightweight communication protocols<\/a>. This minimizes dependencies between components, allowing for easier updates and scaling<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Microservices typically communicate with each other using application programming interfaces<\/a> (APIs). They define<\/a> the kinds of requests that can be made, how to make them, the data formats that should be used, and so on.<\/p>\n

Examples of communication protocols include:<\/p>\n