Caching with Spring's Cache Abstraction

Enable caching with @EnableCaching and annotate methods with @Cacheable (read-through), @CachePut (update) and @CacheEvict (invalidate). Choose a provider: Caffeine for fast in-process caches, Redis for shared caches across instances. Set TTLs per cache, cache only data safe to share, and remember annotations work via proxies (self-invocation bypasses them).

@Configuration
@EnableCaching
class CacheConfig {
    @Bean
    RedisCacheManagerBuilderCustomizer ttl() {
        return builder -> builder
                .withCacheConfiguration("products", RedisCacheConfiguration.defaultCacheConfig().entryTtl(Duration.ofMinutes(10)))
                .withCacheConfiguration("rates", RedisCacheConfiguration.defaultCacheConfig().entryTtl(Duration.ofSeconds(60)));
    }
}

@Service
class ProductCatalog {
    @Cacheable(cacheNames = "products", key = "#id")
    public ProductResponse get(long id) { /* DB lookup */ }

    @CacheEvict(cacheNames = "products", key = "#id")
    public void updatePrice(long id, long priceCents) { /* update */ }
}

Common pitfalls

• Caching per-user data under keys that don't include the user.
• No TTLs, so stale data lives forever.
• Caching mutable entities instead of immutable DTOs.

Key points

• @Cacheable / @CacheEvict
• Caffeine local, Redis shared
• TTL per cache; cache DTOs

Further reading: Spring Boot: Caching