More servers when busy
An online shop may need extra servers during a sale. An elastic system can add them for the rush and remove them afterwards, so the team does not have to keep enough servers for its busiest day running all year.
Adding or removing capacity is called scaling. Elasticity describes how well a system can match its capacity to demand. Teams can automate that response, but must set it up.
Extra servers need planning
Adding servers helps only if the app and its database can use them. New servers also take time to start, so teams plan and test for busy periods. AWS also uses “Elastic” in service names, including Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) and Elastic Beanstalk.