Give every request a time limit

How to do it

Abort reads after 10 to 15 seconds and writes after 30, with AbortSignal.timeout. Keep these longer than the server's own limits, as timeouts says. After 3 seconds, show "Still working" in the view. Retry reads with backoff and jitter, at most 3 times. Honour Retry-After. Never repeat a write without an idempotency key. Cancel requests whose answer is no longer needed, such as an old search.

Examples

TypeScript example

const READ_TIMEOUT_MS = 12_000;
const SLOW_AFTER_MS = 3_000;

export async function loadWithTimeLimit<T>(url: string, onSlow: () => void, cancel?: AbortSignal): Promise<T> {
  const slowTimer = setTimeout(onSlow, SLOW_AFTER_MS);
  const signals = [AbortSignal.timeout(READ_TIMEOUT_MS), ...(cancel ? [cancel] : [])];
  try {
    const response = await fetch(url, { signal: AbortSignal.any(signals) });
    if (!response.ok) throw new LoadError(response.status, await response.json().catch(() => null));
    return response.json();
  } finally {
    clearTimeout(slowTimer);
  }
}

Python example

from playwright.sync_api import expect

def test_slow_orders_show_progress_then_error(page):
    held_open = []
    page.route("**/api/orders*", held_open.append)
    page.goto("https://staging.example.com/orders")
    expect(page.get_by_text("Still working")).to_be_visible(timeout=4_000)
    expect(page.get_by_role("button", name="Try again")).to_be_visible(timeout=15_000)

How to check

A browser test holds the orders request open and never answers it. "Still working" appears after 3 seconds, and the error view with a retry button appears at the time limit. A second test holds a write without an idempotency key open, and it is sent once only.

Sources

• DOM Standard on AbortSignal.timeout()

Related rules

• API-34 Retry with backoff and jitter in API design
• API-35 Set timeouts on every call in API design
• API-32 Accept idempotency keys on POST that creates or charges in API design