Polling: A Comprehensive Guide for Product Managers

4 min readNov 1, 2023

In the digital age, ensuring real-time or near-real-time communication between systems is crucial. For Product Managers (PMs), understanding the mechanisms behind these communications can be the difference between a product that thrives and one that barely survives. One such mechanism is “polling.” This article dives deep into polling, its advantages, disadvantages, and practical examples.

What is Polling?

Polling is a communication mechanism where a client system periodically checks with a server system to retrieve new data or updates. Instead of the server notifying the client immediately when there’s new data (as in webhooks), the client asks the server at regular intervals.

How Does Polling Work?

Request: The client sends a request to the server.
Wait: The server processes the request.
Response: The server sends back the requested data or an indication that there’s no new data.
Interval: The client waits for a predetermined amount of time.
Repeat: The process starts over.

Advantages of Polling

Simplicity: Polling is straightforward to implement. It doesn’t require setting up listeners or callback URLs.
Control: The client has control over when to make requests. This can be useful in situations where the client wants to limit the number of requests.
Compatibility: Polling uses standard HTTP requests, making it compatible with most systems.

Disadvantages of Polling

Overhead: Polling can be resource-intensive. If there’s no new data, the client still makes requests, consuming bandwidth and server resources.
Latency: There might be a delay between when new data becomes available and when the client retrieves it.
Scalability: As the number of clients increases, the server might get overwhelmed with requests.

Practical Examples for Product Managers

1. E-commerce Inventory Updates

Scenario: An e-commerce platform wants to keep its product inventory updated across multiple storefronts.

Polling Solution: Each storefront periodically polls the central inventory system to check for product availability updates. If a product is out of stock in the central system, the storefront updates its display accordingly.

2. Social Media Feed Refresh

Scenario: A social media app wants to display the latest posts to its users.

Polling Solution: The app polls the server every few minutes to retrieve any new posts. When a user pulls to refresh their feed, the app can also initiate a poll.

3. Monitoring System Health

Scenario: A company wants to monitor the health and performance of its servers.

Polling Solution: A monitoring tool polls each server at regular intervals, checking for metrics like CPU usage, memory consumption, and disk space. If any metric crosses a threshold, the tool can trigger an alert.

Alternatives to Polling

While polling has its uses, there are alternatives that might be more suitable depending on the use case:

Webhooks: A push mechanism where the server notifies the client immediately when there’s new data.
Long Polling: A variation of polling where the server holds the request open until new data is available.
WebSockets: Establishes a persistent, two-way communication channel between client and server.
Server-Sent Events (SSE): The server pushes real-time updates to a web application over HTTP.

Here’s a mind map visualizing the differences and similarities between Webhooks and Polling:

For Product Managers, understanding when and how to use polling is essential. While it offers simplicity and control, it’s crucial to weigh these benefits against potential downsides like overhead and latency. By considering the specific needs of your product and the nature of the data you’re dealing with, you can make an informed decision about whether polling is the right choice or if another communication mechanism might be more appropriate.

Thanks for reading! If you’ve got ideas to contribute to this conversation please comment. If you like what you read and want to see more, clap me some love! Follow me here, or connect with me on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Do check out my latest Product Management resources 👇