Since Payara Micro 4.1.1.162

You may specify on the command line using --lite option, or through the API, that a Payara Micro instance is a lite instance. Then the Payara Micro instance will join the cluster but will not store any clustered data; for example web session data or JCache data. This is very useful for a number of scenarios.

You can create a cluster topology whereby a web application is hosted in a number of Payara Micro instances and the garbage collection ergonomics for these instances are tuned for throughput. In addition, a number of Payara Micro instances can be in the cluster with no applications deployed and these instances can be tuned for long-lived web session data. In this case, the web application instances could be designated as lite cluster members to make sure no web session data is stored within their JVMs.