How does horizontal scaling benefit a cloud service?

Horizontal scaling, also known as scaling out, involves adding more instances of resources—such as servers or virtual machines—to distribute the load and handle increased demand. This approach allows cloud services to accommodate growth effectively without being constrained by the limitations of a single instance. By enabling the easy addition of more resources, horizontal scaling ensures that applications can maintain performance levels as user loads increase, providing greater flexibility and resilience.

For example, in a web application, if traffic increases, additional server instances can be provisioned quickly to manage the rise in requests, thereby preventing downtime or slow response times. This capability is one of the core advantages of cloud computing, allowing businesses to respond dynamically to changes in workload demands.

The option about simplifying application programming typically addresses the design and architecture of applications rather than the scaling mechanism itself. Reducing energy consumption is more related to data center efficiency strategies, such as virtualization or optimization of hardware. The statement regarding technical staff is not directly influenced by scaling; horizontal scaling can require more management, depending on the complexity and the tools used for orchestrating additional resources.