valyala/fasthttp

Analysis updated 2026-06-21

★ 23,349GoAudience · developerComplexity · 3/5Setup · moderate

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((repo))
    What it does
      Fast HTTP server
      Memory pooling
      Low latency
    Performance
      6x faster stdlib
      200k requests sec
      Less GC pressure
    Use cases
      Ad servers
      Edge proxies
      High load APIs
    Setup
      Go library
      Drop-in alternative

mindmap root((repo)) What it does Fast HTTP server Memory pooling Low latency Performance 6x faster stdlib 200k requests sec Less GC pressure Use cases Ad servers Edge proxies High load APIs Setup Go library Drop-in alternative

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What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Build a Go HTTP server that handles hundreds of thousands of tiny requests per second at sub-millisecond latency

USE CASE 2

Replace net/http in a Go service that is hitting performance limits under heavy traffic

USE CASE 3

Build a high-speed reverse proxy or edge computing node in Go

USE CASE 4

Serve an ad-serving backend in Go where consistent low latency under extreme load is critical

What is it built with?

How does it compare?

	valyala/fasthttp	gastownhall/beads	air-verse/air
Stars	23,349	23,278	23,493
Language	Go	Go	Go
Setup difficulty	moderate	moderate	easy
Complexity	3/5	3/5	2/5
Audience	developer	developer	developer

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · moderate Time to first run · 30min

API differs from standard net/http so handlers cannot be copied directly, migration requires rewriting handler signatures.

In plain English

Fasthttp is a high-speed HTTP library for Go, the programming language, not a product for end users. HTTP is the protocol that powers web communication: every time a browser requests a webpage or an app calls an API, it uses HTTP. Go has a built-in HTTP library called net/http, and fasthttp is an alternative to it, optimized for speed. The key design choice behind fasthttp is avoiding memory allocation in performance-critical code paths. In Go, creating new memory objects during a request causes the garbage collector to do extra cleanup work, which adds latency. Fasthttp reuses objects (pooling them) so garbage collection happens far less often, keeping response times consistently low even under extreme load. Benchmarks in the README show fasthttp is up to 6 times faster than Go's standard HTTP library when handling many requests per second. One known production user serves up to 200,000 requests per second from a single physical server. The README itself warns that fasthttp is not for most projects, if your server handles a normal load, the built-in Go library is simpler and more compatible with the ecosystem. Fasthttp is purpose-built for situations where you need to squeeze maximum throughput: ad servers, proxies, edge computing nodes, or any service that must handle thousands of tiny requests per second at sub-millisecond latency.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1

Show me how to build a simple HTTP server with fasthttp in Go that handles GET and POST requests

Prompt 2

How do I migrate an existing Go net/http handler to fasthttp for better throughput?

Prompt 3

Write a fasthttp server in Go that reads a query parameter, calls an upstream API, and returns the result as JSON

Prompt 4

How do I add request logging middleware to a fasthttp server in Go?

Prompt 5

When should I use fasthttp instead of Go's standard net/http package, what are the real-world trade-offs?

Frequently asked questions

What is fasthttp?

fasthttp is a Go HTTP library built for extreme throughput, up to 10x faster than Go's standard library by reusing memory instead of allocating it, designed for ad servers, proxies, and any service handling hundreds of thousands of requests per second.

What language is fasthttp written in?

Mainly Go. The stack also includes Go.

How hard is fasthttp to set up?

Setup difficulty is rated moderate, with roughly 30min to a first successful run.

Who is fasthttp for?

Mainly developer.

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