A hardware load balancer is a physical device that distributes network traffic across multiple servers. This helps ensure that no single server becomes overwhelmed, improving performance and reliability. By managing incoming requests, it can enhance the user experience and provide redundancy in case of server failure. These devices often come with advanced features like SSL offloading and traffic monitoring. They are commonly used in data centers and large-scale applications to optimize resource use and maintain high availability. Popular brands include F5 Networks and Citrix, which offer various models tailored to different business needs.