Why setTimeout is Lying to Your Retry Logic

📰 Dev.to · Arnav Gupta

Learn how setTimeout can deceive your retry logic and how to fix it with a simple async/await pattern

intermediate Published 17 Jun 2026
Action Steps
  1. Write a simple retry function using async/await
  2. Use setTimeout to introduce a delay between retries
  3. Test the function with a failing operation to see how setTimeout affects the retry logic
  4. Apply a fix using a more accurate timing mechanism, such as Date.now()
  5. Compare the results with and without the fix to see the improvement in retry logic accuracy
Who Needs to Know This

Developers and DevOps engineers who implement retry logic in their applications will benefit from understanding this concept to improve the reliability of their systems

Key Insight

💡 setTimeout is not a reliable way to measure time in retry logic due to its asynchronous nature

Share This
🚨 Did you know setTimeout can lie to your retry logic? 🤔 Learn how to fix it with a simple async/await pattern 💻

Key Takeaways

Learn how setTimeout can deceive your retry logic and how to fix it with a simple async/await pattern

Full Article

You've written retry logic. It probably looks something like this: async function withRetry(fn,...
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