How would you debug a Lambda function that is timing out? What steps would you take to test and troubleshoot it?

To debug a Lambda that times out, first check CloudWatch Logs for error messages and the exact point of failure. Verify the configured timeout value in the Lambda console; if it’s too low, increase it. Use the SAM CLI or the Lambda test event to run the function locally with sample payloads and step through the code. Enable AWS X‑Ray tracing to see where the latency is coming from—database calls, external APIs, or heavy computation. If the function is making network calls, add retry logic and exponential back‑off. Profile the code with the AWS Lambda Power Tuning tool to find the optimal memory/CPU allocation; higher memory gives more CPU, often reducing runtime. If the function still times out, consider breaking the workload into smaller, asynchronous Lambda invocations or moving long‑running logic to Step Functions or an ECS/Fargate task. Finally, monitor the function’s metrics (Invocations, Duration, Errors, Throttles) in CloudWatch to confirm the fix.