What is throughput?Throughput is a measure of how many units of information a system can process in a given amount of time. It is applied broadly to systems ranging from various aspects of computer and network systems to organizations. Show
Related measures of system productivity include the speed with which a specific workload can be completed and response time, which is the amount of time between a single interactive user request and receipt of the response. Types of throughputHistorically, throughput has been a measure of the comparative effectiveness of large commercial computers that run many programs concurrently. Throughput metrics have adapted with the evolution of computing, using various benchmarks to measure throughput in different use cases. Batches per day and teraflopsAn early throughput measure was the number of batch jobs completed in a day. More recent measures assume either a more complicated mixture of work or focus on a particular aspect of computer operation. Units like trillion floating-point operations per second (teraflops) provide a metric to compare the cost of raw computing over time or by manufacturer. Network throughput and bits per secondIn data transmission, network throughput is the amount of data moved successfully from one place to another in a given time period. Network throughput is typically measured in bits per second (bps), as in megabits per second (Mbps) or gigabits per second (Gbps). Storage throughput and bytes per secondIn storage systems, throughput refers to either of the following:
Storage throughput is typically measured in bytes per second (Bps). It can also refer to the number of discrete input or output (I/O) operations responded to in a second, or IOPS. Transactions per secondThroughput applies at higher levels of IT infrastructure as well. IT teams can discuss databases or other middleware with a term like transactions per second (TPS). Web servers can be discussed in terms of pageviews per minute. Throughput also applies to the people and organizations using these systems. Independent of the TPS rating of its help desk software, for example, a help desk has its own throughput rate that includes the time staff spend on developing responses to requests. Throughput, bandwidth and latencySeveral related terms -- throughput, bandwidth and latency -- are sometimes mistakenly interchanged. Network bandwidth refers to the capacity of the network for data to be moved at one time. Throughput expresses the amount of data. Latency refers to the speed at which data is transmitted. Network throughput and latency together reflect a network's performance. Throughput vs. network bandwidthBandwidth is the capacity of a wired or wireless network communications link to transmit the maximum amount of data from one point to another over a computer network or internet connection in a given amount of time -- usually one second. Synonymous with capacity, bandwidth describes the data transfer rate. Bandwidth is not a measure of network speed -- a common misconception. While bandwidth is traditionally expressed in bits per second, modern network links have greater capacity, which is typically measured in millions of bits per second (Mbps) or billions of bits per second (Gbps). Throughput is necessarily lower than bandwidth because bandwidth represents the maximum capabilities of a network rather than the actual transfer rate.
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