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This systematic literature review synthesizes research on energy efficiency in microservice architectures, revealing that current approaches primarily focus on operational optimizations at runtime, such as monitoring and resource management. The study identifies a significant gap in design-time considerations for energy efficiency, which are often overlooked in architectural discussions. Key findings indicate that measurement practices are predominantly infrastructure-oriented, relying on model-based estimations rather than comprehensive lifecycle approaches, underscoring the need for integrating energy efficiency into architectural design from the outset.
Energy efficiency in microservices is often treated as an operational issue, neglecting its critical role in architectural design.
Context. Microservice architectures are widely adopted for building scalable cloud-native systems, enabling independent deployment, fine-grained service composition, and operational elasticity. Problem. Despite growing interest in sustainable software, research on energy efficiency in microservices spans operational, infrastructural, and architectural perspectives, but these are typically addressed in isolation. Existing studies focus on optimisation techniques or measurement approaches, with limited synthesis of how energy efficiency is considered, measured, and addressed at the architectural level. Goal. This study synthesises research on energy-efficient microservices by examining where energy efficiency is considered, how it is measured, and which architectural solutions have been proposed. Method. We conduct a systematic literature review following Kitchenham's guidelines, screening publications from four major digital libraries through a six-stage process with backward and forward snowballing, resulting in 40 primary studies. Results. Energy efficiency is predominantly addressed at runtime through monitoring, scheduling, and resource management, while design-time integration remains limited. Measurement practices are largely infrastructure-oriented and rely on model-based estimation and coarse-grained monitoring. Conclusion. Energy efficiency in microservices is primarily treated as an operational optimisation problem rather than a lifecycle-spanning architectural concern, highlighting the need for earlier architectural integration and improved measurement practices.
