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requests.exceptions.ReadTimeout

The server took too long to respond

Seen in Python requests, urllib3 (ReadTimeoutError)

The connection opened and the request was sent, but the server did not send data within the read timeout.

Common causes

  • The endpoint is slow, overloaded or stuck waiting on a database or upstream.
  • The read timeout is shorter than the time the request legitimately needs.
  • A proxy or load balancer is holding the request without forwarding it.

How to fix it

  1. Measure how long the endpoint takes with curl -w "%{time_total}\n" and set the read timeout above it.
  2. Check server and upstream logs for slow queries or errors.
  3. Retry idempotent requests with backoff (urllib3 Retry).
Measure connection latency

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