Apache Kafka Complete Practice Exam 2025 – All-in-One Prep

Relying too heavily on swap space in Kafka, or any application, can lead to delayed response times. This occurs because when an application’s memory usage exceeds the available RAM, the operating system begins to use swap space on the disk as a backup for memory. Accessing data in swap space is significantly slower than accessing data in RAM due to the inherent latency of disk I/O operations. As a result, processes may become slower when they need to swap data in and out of the slower storage, particularly in high-throughput systems like Kafka that are designed for low-latency message processing.

The other choices don't pertain to the negative impact of using swap space. Increased performance is not a valid outcome, as relying on swap typically degrades performance. Similarly, greater data integrity is not directly affected by the swap space and may even suffer if performance is hindered, as tasks may not complete in a timely manner. Improved resource allocation also is misleading; while there may be a way to allocate more virtual memory via swap, it often leads to inefficient use of resources by forcing the application to operate in a state of increased latency. Thus, delayed response times is the most relevant concern when considering the disadvantages of heavy reliance on swap space.