How do benchmarks evaluate data ingestion speed?

Benchmarks evaluate data ingestion speed by measuring how quickly a system can accept, process, and store incoming data from various sources. This typically involves testing throughput (data volume per second), latency (time from data arrival to availability), and scalability (performance under increasing loads). These metrics help developers understand system limitations, identify bottlenecks, and optimize pipelines. Benchmarks often simulate real-world scenarios, such as ingesting data from APIs, logs, or IoT devices, to ensure results reflect practical use cases.

For example, a benchmark might measure how many records per second a database can ingest from a Kafka stream while maintaining low latency. Tools like Apache Kafka’s built-in performance tests or custom scripts are used to generate load and track metrics. Throughput is calculated by dividing total records processed by test duration, while latency is measured by timestamps added at data entry and checked after storage. Scalability tests incrementally increase the number of data sources or data volume to see if throughput scales linearly. If a system handles 10,000 records/second with one node but only 15,000 with two nodes, it indicates a bottleneck in coordination or resource allocation.

Benchmarks also evaluate resource efficiency, such as CPU, memory, and network usage during ingestion. For instance, a system might achieve high throughput but consume excessive CPU, making it costly to scale. Tools like Prometheus or Grafana are often used to monitor these metrics. Real-world factors like data format (JSON, CSV), compression, and network latency are included in tests. A benchmark might compare Avro vs. JSON ingestion to show how schema-based formats reduce parsing overhead. By isolating variables—like disabling encryption or caching—developers pinpoint optimizations, such as switching to a more efficient serialization format or tuning buffer sizes.