Serverless architecture is a cloud computing model where developers build and run applications without managing underlying server infrastructure. In serverless computing, the cloud provider dynamically allocates compute resources on-demand, automatically scales based on traffic, and charges only for actual execution time and resources consumed. The model excels at event-driven workloads, enabling applications to react to triggers like HTTP requests, database changes, file uploads, scheduled tasks, and message queues. While "serverless" doesn't mean servers disappear — they're simply abstracted away — this paradigm shift allows teams to focus entirely on business logic rather than infrastructure management, making it particularly effective for APIs, data pipelines, real-time processing, and microservices where cost efficiency and automatic scalability are critical.