Why RabbitMQ 4.0 should be on your radar – even if you’re not in the technical circle

It has been long anticipated that we could expect the arrival of RabbitMQ 4.0 before the year is out.  Now with the recent regular Beta releases, that speculation has been confirmed. But why should an upgrade to 4.0 be on your radar? 

You may be running 3.x just fine.  After all RabbitMQ is notably reliable.  So reliable in fact some members outside of the technical circle may not be aware that RabbitMQ forms a part of your stack at all. If you’re in this camp, here’s the main point to note:  RabbitMQ is a vital component for enterprise messaging systems playing a crucial role in the smooth running of many business operations by enabling different parts to communicate seamlessly with each other…  Certainly radar worthy!

But why the upgrade? 

Standing still and not upsetting the status quo can be just as damaging when the rest of the world is embroiled in a race for the next best technology. As digital transformation takes hold, businesses continue to modernise their infrastructure at pace.  A 2023 IDC report for example suggests that global spending on digital transformation will reach $3.4 trillion by 2026.  

The evolving demands of customers and advances in technology calls for businesses to reevaluate and reshape operating models and processes, allowing them to be more agile and keep up with the changing pace.  As IT infrastructures therefore adopt more and more components becoming more and more complex, it is especially critical that key components, like message brokers, are at the top of their game. 

RabbitMQ for example acts as a key conduit for distributed systems, allowing applications, services and microservices to exchange real-time data and operate in sync.  It is vital therefore to protect it…

Won’t 3.x just do the job sufficiently?

For a time, yes. But as with any technology, legacy versions will quickly become outdated, making them more prone to issues in a changing environment, more vulnerable and more difficult to maintain.  Community Support for RabbitMQ 3.x will cease upon the release of RabbitMQ 4.0.  Now, whilst specialist consultancies such as ourselves at Seventh State can and do continue to proactively support legacy systems, the end of community support will bring an end to all updates and crucial security patches for older versions. 

Ok, so what’s new with RabbitMQ 4.0?

Our engineers have a constant eye on the updates coming from the RabbitMQ core team, with many of the upcoming features warranting explanation. You can find further details about many of the new RabbitMQ 4.0 features on our blog as linked below:

Quorum Queues

Quorum Queues in RabbitMQ ensure data replication across multiple nodes, maintaining reliability even in the event of network partitions or node failures.

Business Benefits:

• Data Integrity
• Business Continuity

Read more about Quorum Queues.

Prometheus Metrics and Grafana Dashboards

Integration with Prometheus for metrics collection and Grafana for dashboarding provides comprehensive observability and monitoring.

Business Benefits:

• Real-time monitoring
• Data Led Insights

We’ve recently created our own Grafana dashboards – check them out.

RabbitMQ on Kubernetes

Deploys RabbitMQ on Kubernetes, providing flexibility to manage and scale messaging services across various environments.

Business Benefits:

• Scalability
• Operational Efficiency

Streams

Streams offer a static log feature for message replay and high-throughput messaging via the stream protocol.

Business Benefits:

• High Throughput
• Durable Storage

Want to understand the difference between Streams and Queues in RabbitMQ? Read all about it in our blog post.

Native MQTT 5.0

Adds support for MQTT 5.0, turning RabbitMQ into a robust IoT broker.

Business Benefits:

• IoT Integration
• Enhanced Protocol Support

Khepri

Utilises the Raft consensus algorithm to offer a secure and scalable metadata store, helping to alleviate split-brain scenarios.

Business Benefits:

• Resilience
• Secure Storage

Explore Khepri and join one of our expert engineers as they go under the hood of RabbitMQ in this article.

Native AMQP 1.0

Updates RabbitMQ to support AMQP 1.0, enhancing the core messaging protocol.

Business Benefits:

• Interoperability 
• Future-Proofing

So what does RabbitMQ 4.0 bring to businesses overall?

Essentially upgrading to RabbitMQ 4.0 when it officially arrives will help to ensure your business is as stable, reliable and safe as possible whilst allowing you to move quickly to address future market changes. Here’s how: 

Future-proofing 

RabbitMQ 4.0 is optimised for modern architectures, like microservices, containerisation, and cloud-native environments.  It is therefore more likely to see your messaging infrastructure remain compatible with new emerging technologies and evolving components in your current tech stack, without the need of significant overhauls to your setup.

Efficiency

With RabbitMQ 4.0 supports multiple protocols, including native AMQP 1.0 and MQTT making it an even more versatile messaging broker, meaning that organisations can more easily integrate with other existing systems and microservices. This interoperability reduces the need for additional middleware and simplifies your overall architecture, leading to cost savings and fewer compatibility issues. 

Innovation & Agility

Not only can your tech stack be compatible with the latest technologies that arise, but keeping RabbitMQ up to date, ensuring the quick adoption and integration of them into your systems, enabling you to innovate responsively and stay ahead of the market.  Failing to keep critical components like RabbitMQ up to date could add to your overall ‘technical debt’, making it harder to maintain, more vulnerable and ultimately slowing down your business’s agility. 

Resiliency & Consistency

As a critical component of your tech stack, you need to be confident that your system will continue functioning as it should despite unexpected failures.  The depreciation of Classic Mirror Queues to Quorum Queues in RabbitMQ 4.0 improves consistency of data across nodes, making your system more reliable and robust.

Security & Compliance

Don’t forget, if you’re in a regulated industry, there will be compliance regulations that call for up to date technologies and security features to protect sensitive information. For these industries in particular, upgrading to RabbitMQ 4.0 should be on your radar to ensure its adoption in a timely manner. RabbitMQ 4.0 also comes with enhanced security features including improvements in encryption, authentication and access controls. You can read more about RabbitMQ 4.0 security features in the official documentation.

In summary, upgrading to RabbitMQ 4.0 is a strategic move that should be on the radar of your wider senior teams, not just your technical decision makers. The move will position you in a good place to capitalise on future innovations, reduce costs, enhance security, and support ongoing growth. With RabbitMQ 4.0, you are not just upgrading a messaging tool; you are strengthening the foundation upon which your business communications are built.