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How do you handle graceful shutdown in a Node.js application?

Q: How do you handle graceful shutdown in a Node.js application?

**TL;DR.** On a termination signal ( SIGTERM / SIGINT ), **stop accepting new work, finish in-flight requests, close resources** (HTTP server, DB pool, queues), then exit. Add a **timeout** so a stuck connection can't hang forever. This prevents dropped requests and corrupted state during deploys/restarts. SIGTERM received stop new connections <path class='d-edge-accent' d='M232 80 H260'

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This question assesses knowledge of how to properly terminate a Node.js application without data loss or service disruption.

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Graceful shutdown with timeout

function shutdown(signal) {
  console.log(signal, '→ shutting down');
  server.close(async () => {        // stop new, drain in-flight
    await pool.end();               // close DB pool
    process.exit(0);
  });
  setTimeout(() => process.exit(1), 10_000).unref();  // hard cap
}
process.on('SIGTERM', () => shutdown('SIGTERM'));
process.on('SIGINT', () => shutdown('SIGINT'));

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