Source: https://gameye.com/glossary/load-balancing/

---
title: "Load Balancing | Gameye"
description: "Load balancing distributes player connections across servers so no single machine becomes a bottleneck — keeping your game responsive under heavy traffic."
---

# Load Balancing

Load balancing is the process of distributing work — player connections, session requests, API calls — across multiple servers so that no single machine carries more traffic than it can handle. When one server is busy, the load balancer routes new requests to a less busy one.

## Load balancing vs. auto-scaling

These two concepts are often confused but do different things:

- **Load balancing** distributes traffic across the servers you already have running.

- **Auto-scaling** adds or removes servers in response to overall demand.

A production game infrastructure typically uses both: the orchestrator auto-scales to match player concurrency, and a load balancer distributes incoming connections across the available pool.

## Types of load balancing

**Round-robin** sends each new request to the next server in sequence — simple, but ignores how busy each server actually is. **Least-connections** routes to whichever server has the fewest active sessions — better for uneven workloads. **Geographic** routing sends players to the nearest server cluster, reducing latency before the connection is even established.

## Load balancing for dedicated game servers

In game server infrastructure, “load balancing” often means **session placement** — deciding which physical machine in which region should run a new match. An orchestrator like Gameye handles this automatically: when a matchmaker requests a session, Gameye evaluates available capacity across providers and regions, places the session on the optimal host, and returns a connection address to the client. The placement decision happens in milliseconds.

**See also:** [Auto-scaling](https://gameye.com/glossary/auto-scaling/) · [Scalability](https://gameye.com/glossary/scalability/) · [How Gameye game server orchestration works](https://gameye.com/how-it-works/)

Building a multiplayer game? Gameye hosts dedicated game servers: ship your server as a Docker container and start one per match with a single API call, in a region near your players.

[See how it works →](https://gameye.com/how-it-works/)

[Back to Glossary](https://gameye.com/glossary/)

## Related terms

- ### Auto scaling

Auto scaling starts new game server instances as player load rises and releases them when demand drops — no manual intervention required. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/auto-scaling/)
- ### Scalability

Scalability is infrastructure’s ability to handle rising player demand — more sessions, regions, and traffic — without degrading performance or manual ops. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/scalability/)
- ### Orchestrator

An orchestrator automates game server lifecycle — starting sessions on demand, placing them in the optimal region, and shutting them down when matches end. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/orchestrator/)
- ### Session hosting

Session hosting is when a server, or computer, runs your game’s matches. Each match, with a set group of people, is considered a session. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/session-hosting/)
- ### Infrastructure

Game server infrastructure is the hardware and software that hosts dedicated servers and keeps multiplayer sessions running reliably at scale. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/infrastructure/)