MySQL replication is often positioned as a solution to provide extra throughput for your database (especially when dealing with high numbers of read operations). What tends to be overlooked is how it can be used to provide high availability (HA) – no matter how much redundancy you have at a local level, your system remains at risk from a single catastrophic failure – loss of power, earthquake, terrorist attack etc. By using MySQL asynchronous replication to maintain a geographically remote copy of that data, service can be maintained through any single site failure.