What is High Availability?

High Availability refers to an approach or set of strategies designed to ensure that a system remains operational and accessible with minimal downtime. This concept is crucial in environments where uninterrupted access to data and services is essential, such as in financial systems, healthcare applications, and online services.

To achieve high availability, organizations often implement redundant systems, failover mechanisms, and load balancing to manage and route user requests effectively. It ensures that even in the event of component failures, such as hardware malfunctions or software issues, the system can quickly switch to backup systems or reroute tasks, thus preventing service interruption.

This concept is distinct from other options because it focuses specifically on keeping systems running smoothly at all times rather than archiving data, managing user requests, or tracking performance metrics. Each of those functions plays a role in the overall management and effectiveness of a system but does not specifically address the core principle of maintaining persistent and reliable access.