Apigee - SpikeArrest behavior

Question

We\'re using a spikearrest policy but we don\'t understand how is working. The spike arrest configuration is the following:

Answer 1

Spike Arrest of 5 per minute means it will allow a maximum of 5 messages per minute and equally distribute those 5 messages over the span of a minute i.e 1 message is allowed in each 12 secs window of a minute.Now if the spike arrest counters are not being synced across two message processors and it is strict round robin then the value of messages allowed per time unit will be doubled, which in your case maybe 2 messages in 12 secs, hence the noticed behaviour.