6 caching strategies explained: cache-aside, read-through, write-behind and more

goyalshaliniuk · x · 2026-10-23

Engineer Shalini Goyal breaks down six core caching strategies and their trade-offs between speed, consistency, and fault tolerance:

Cache-aside: app checks cache first, falls back to DB and backfills; simple but adds latency on misses
Read-through: cache itself fetches missing data from the DB
Refresh-ahead: proactively preloads hot data to cut misses, at the risk of wasteful refreshes
Write-through: writes to cache and DB simultaneously for consistency, higher write latency
Write-behind: writes to cache first, async DB update, better write performance
Write-around: writes directly to DB, bypassing the cache to avoid pollution but risking misses on fresh data

The core of choosing is balancing speed vs consistency vs fault tolerance across read- and write-heavy workloads.

More from Infra