Using @Timed Annotation in SpringBoot for Automatic Request Time Statistics

In SpringBoot development, the @Timed annotation can automatically record the execution time of controller methods, eliminating the need for repetitive manual timing code.

Traditional manual timing requires recording a start timestamp, executing the business logic, recording an end timestamp, calculating the duration, and logging it, which leads to verbose and duplicated code.

public String getUserInfo(String userId) {
    long startTime = System.currentTimeMillis();
    // get user info
    String result = userService.getUserById(userId);
    long endTime = System.currentTimeMillis();
    long executionTime = endTime - startTime;
    logger.info("Execution time for getUserInfo: " + executionTime + " ms");
    return result;
}

By adding the @Timed annotation, Spring automatically records the method’s execution time and logs it, removing the need for the manual code above.

@Timed
@GetMapping("/user/{userId}")
public String getUserInfo(@PathVariable String userId) {
    return userService.getUserById(userId);
}

The annotation also supports advanced features such as custom metric names and extra tags, which help differentiate metrics for various request types.

@Timed(value = "user.getInfo", extraTags = {"type", "profile"})
@GetMapping("/user/{userId}")
public String getUserInfo(@PathVariable String userId) {
    return userService.getUserById(userId);
}

In a real e‑commerce project, many endpoints were annotated with @Timed , for example:

@Timed
@GetMapping("/products")
public List
getProducts() {
    return productService.getAllProducts();
}

This approach simplifies time statistics, improves development efficiency, enhances code maintainability, and provides flexible tagging for detailed performance analysis.