# Worker Backpressure (Part 1)

DevFeed: [Worker Backpressure (Part 1)](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/worker-backpressure-part-1-37935.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://www.canva.dev/blog/engineering/worker-backpressure-part-1-how-we-taught-our-queue-workers-to-slow-down/>)

Author: Mikalai Barysau

Published: 2026-09-17T00:00:00Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Canva Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/canva-engineering.md>)

Topics: [backpressure](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/backpressure.md>), [Back end](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/backend.md>), [reliability](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/reliability.md>)

Tags: [backend](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/backend.md>), [backpressure](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/backpressure.md>), [dependencies](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/dependencies.md>), [outage](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/outage.md>), [queue](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/queue.md>), [reliability](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/reliability.md>), [worker](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/worker.md>)

## AI overview

Canva describes Worker Backpressure, a reliability mechanism for queue workers that slows processing when dependencies fail and speeds it back up after recovery. During a cloud-provider outage, the mechanism helped prevent failed messages from accumulating on the Dead Letter Queue and avoided an on-call page.

## Source excerpt

How we taught Canva's queue workers to slow down when dependencies fail, then speed back up on their own.