--- title: Stop Crashing Your Servers: The Ultimate Guide to... description: Fetching entire datasets without pagination causes database overload, OOM crashes, and browser freezes. Two main pagination strategies exist: offset-based... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/stop-crashing-your-servers-the-ultimate-guide-to-pagination-offset-vs-cursor--pzqbdxfml twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Stop Crashing Your Servers: The Ultimate Guide to Pagination (Offset vs. Cursor) | daily.dev og:description: Fetching entire datasets without pagination causes database overload, OOM crashes, and browser freezes. Two main pagination strategies exist: offset-based... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/stop-crashing-your-servers-the-ultimate-guide-to-pagination-offset-vs-cursor--pzqbdxfml og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/pZqBdXFmL.png og:image:alt: Stop Crashing Your Servers: The Ultimate Guide to Pagination (Offset vs. Cursor) og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Stop Crashing Your Servers: The Ultimate Guide to Pagination (Offset vs. Cursor) **[Medium](https://daily.dev/sources/medium_js)** · 5 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Fetching entire datasets without pagination causes database overload, OOM crashes, and browser freezes. Two main pagination strategies exist: offset-based (LIMIT/OFFSET SQL) and cursor-based (WHERE id > X). Offset pagination is simple and supports random page jumps but degrades severely on deep pages and suffers from data drift bugs in high-traffic apps. Cursor-based pagination anchors to a specific record ID, keeping query cost constant regardless of depth, making it ideal for infinite scroll, massive datasets, and public APIs. The guide covers when to use each approach and the breaking points that signal it's time to migrate from offset to cursor. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: --- Tags: [#architecture](https://daily.dev/tags/architecture), [#backend](https://daily.dev/tags/backend), [#sql](https://daily.dev/tags/sql) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/stop-crashing-your-servers-the-ultimate-guide-to-pagination-offset-vs-cursor--pzqbdxfml) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Stop Crashing Your Servers: The Ultimate Guide to Pagination (Offset vs. Cursor)","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-crashing-your-servers-the-ultimate-guide-to-pagination-offset-vs-cursor--pzqbdxfml","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-crashing-your-servers-the-ultimate-guide-to-pagination-offset-vs-cursor--pzqbdxfml"},"datePublished":"2026-07-18T08:37:43.493Z","dateModified":"2026-07-18T08:38:25.368Z","description":"Fetching entire datasets without pagination causes database overload, OOM crashes, and browser freezes. Two main pagination strategies exist: offset-based...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/a328a2c8e9220a1c83c2db8785083ff2?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/a328a2c8e9220a1c83c2db8785083ff2?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Medium","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Medium","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/medium","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/medium_js"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-crashing-your-servers-the-ultimate-guide-to-pagination-offset-vs-cursor--pzqbdxfml","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"architecture,backend,sql","timeRequired":"PT5M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Medium","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/medium_js"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Stop Crashing Your Servers: The Ultimate Guide to Pagination (Offset vs. Cursor)"}]} ```