Do You Need the Fastest CDN for Your Website?
Many best CDN providers offer advanced features to help you deliver content faster at a lesser cost. Enormous role in providing excellent delivery of content. Yet, they fail to realize that it may not be the ultimate solution that they need because they didn't consider the various factors when shopping for the Fastest CDN provider.
What is the Fastest CDN?
We all know that speed is one of these considerations, but you mustn't forget about latency, pricing, security, support, and features. You can continue reading to find out what you need when you want to avail of a content delivery solution.
10 Must Required Features of Content Delivery Network Providers (CDNs)
- Speed
- Latency
- Number of Edge Servers (POPs)
- Reliability
- Security
- Price
- Advanced Features
- Platform Integrations
- Support
- Commitment to Continuous Development
#1 Speed
Speed is an essential factor in selecting the fastest CDN provider, and many people want to test the service first. Often, service providers offer free trials so potential customers can experience the content delivery solution before they decide to buy. If you wish to check a specific supplier, you can use numerous speed test tools to assess the performance of your website accurately. Moreover, you must test for image optimization because you must ensure that your users can download the image assets faster.
BelugaCDN scores fastest average load and response time in independent CDN test
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#2 Latency
Latency is the time that it takes for transmission to make a round trip from the browser to the server. Four issues affect latency, and they are:
- Storage delays
- Propagation times
- Transmission mediums
- Router hop delays
If you use a Content Delivery Network, your user accesses your content from the nearest server. As such, the request doesn't need to travel far because the edge server provides the data. On average, the latency decreases by as much as 73% if you host your assets in a content delivery network.
#3 Number of Edge Servers (POPs)
The fastest CDN has an adequate quantity of edge servers. If a CDN provider only has five servers, he can't offer the ultimate speed, especially if you have users across the globe. Thus, if you're looking for a reliable supplier, you must search for one with a minimum of 20 POPs or edge servers that are in strategic places around the world.
#4 Reliability
Reliability is also a significant feature that you need to consider when selecting the Best CDN for WordPress. You surely don't want a provider who'll suddenly stop serving your users. Many suppliers have a mechanism in place, so when an edge server breaks down, another edge server will provide the content.
Another strategy that you can use is to have different CDN providers to serve your static content and to increase your global presence. However, it requires more time because this plan is complicated. It also entails additional expenses.
#5 Security
SSL/TLS alternatives can ensure the encryption of any data you send to your users. Moreover, you must also secure your CDN account because some unscrupulous individuals can steal your password and hack your site. They may use your personal information. Many providers offer two-factor authentication to improve security.
#6 Price
If you're searching for a CDN provider, you must check the company's price range. Many suppliers now charge by the amount of bandwidth that your site consumes. It is essential for you to determine the monthly website traffic, so you can purchase what you need.
#7 Advanced Features
Many best CDN providers offer advanced features to help you deliver content faster at a lesser cost.It's an excellent strategy to shop around and compare suppliers before you choose one.
#8 Platform Integrations
A content delivery network is useless if it's not integrable into your current platform. Thus, before you sign up with a CDN provider, you must ensure that it supports all popular platforms.
#9 Support
Customer service support is essential in the technology industry. It is a vital qualification, so when you select your provider, you must ensure that it gives several selections. Many Top CDN companies today offer phone support, live chat, and ticket support.
#10 Commitment to Continuous Development
A reliable CDN provider commits to continuous development. It means that the company launches new features and supports other protocols as it serves the public.
Different Types of Fastest CDN for WordPress
Speeding up the content delivery must be your priority because search engines include speed in their ranking algorithm. A CDN can help you with this issue because it can reduce server lag by storing static assets on a network of servers located around the world. When you are on the lookout for the fastest CDN, you must consider a provider that fits your requirements. Also, you need to assess your audience, budget, and bandwidth needs. Don't forget to ask about technical support and streaming capabilities.
Let's Go Through Five of The Fastest CDN We Found Online.
1, BelugaCDN
BelugaCDN is the first CDN to use an IPV6 Network, which delivers speed increases of 20–40% on average. BelugaCDN also provides real-time traffic statistics so you can see how fast your website is loading in different locations. BelugaCDN provides DDoS protection, high data transfer speeds, and no long-term contracts.
2, MaxCDN
MaxCDN has a network of optimized SSD-loaded servers around the world. You can decide how your CDN will run by creating custom rules. The company's servers are in at least 90 countries, and each one has a high-peer load capacity. You can use a secure token to lock down your content and use REST API to integrate resources into your content. MaxCDN employs an intelligent best-path routing algorithm to sustain site performance and speed.
3, Amazon CloudFront
Amazon CloudFront integrates its other web services with its CDN to offer a straightforward way to deliver content to users. It provides high data transfer speeds, low latency, and no long-term contracts. You may have your domain name and SSL certificate and track trends in data requests and transfers. You can also use its geo-restriction feature to block content delivery to a specific country. CloudFront offers dynamic content support, custom error responses, a management console, and live media streaming.
4, CloudFlare
Cloudflare optimizer webpage delivery for excellent performance and the fastest loading times. It accelerates and protects your website against crawlers, abusive bots, and threats that waste server resources and bandwidth. You don't need to maintain or install any software or hardware because you only need to change your DNS settings.
5, Google App Engine
Google App Engine allows your applications to use its infrastructure for easy maintenance and scaling as your data storage and traffic change. You don't need any server to maintain because you only need to upload your app to Google's infrastructure. It features load balancing and automatic scaling. Your applications run reliably in a secure environment.
How Does a CDN Work?
A content delivery network (CDN) is a collection of connected servers that aim to deliver content cheaply, quickly, securely, and reliably. The servers are at the Internet Exchange Points (IXPs), where numerous internet providers connect to provide access to traffic from various networks. A CDN provider can reduce transit times and costs while delivering content at high speed.
#1 Latency
If your website can't load its content quickly, your visitors will leave and, chances are, they won't come back. You can prevent this scenario from happening by taking advantage of a CDN service. Let's discuss how it can reduce load times.
- A CDN reduces the distance between your website resources and visitors. Instead of connecting to your origin server, your users can access your content from the nearest data center. Thus, you provide faster service by reducing the amount of time it takes for your pages to load.
- It optimizes both hardware and software through solid-state hard drives and efficient load balancing, so your content reaches the user quickly.
- It reduces the data file sizes through file compression and minification for quicker loading of web pages.
- It speeds up even websites that use SSL/TLS certificates by allowing TLS false start and improving connection reuse.
#2 Redundancy and Reliability
Spikes in traffic and hardware failures due to a boost in popularity or malicious attacks can cause the webserver to break down and prevent users from accessing your service or website. An excellent CDN can minimize downtime with the following features:
- Load balancing allocates network traffic efficiently across all servers, thus ensuring scalability in cases of rapid traffic boosts.
- Intelligent failover offers continuous service even if some of the CDN servers break down due to hardware malfunction. It efficiently redistributes traffic to the other working servers.
- If an entire data center has technical issues, the CDN provider can transfer traffic to another data center. This practice ensures that all users have access to your content.
#3 Data Security
Information security is critical in a CDN service because it needs to keep your website secure with fresh SSL/TLS certificates. It ensures a high standard of encryption, integrity, and authentication.
Do I Need a CDN?
We already discussed the fastest CDN and its various types. Moreover, you now know how a content delivery network works. In this section, we'll help you decide if you need a CDN or not. Some websites don't require a content delivery network, so it's essential that you focus first on your requirements.
For instance, if your target audience is from a specific country or location, you only need to get a web hosting service that has a nearby server. You must search for a geo-located web host and not a geo-located content delivery network.
Moreover, if you want to use CDN only to block bad traffic, you're better off with a dedicated security solution. Some CDN providers offer robust security features, but you can always find a similar service elsewhere.
If you already have a reputable WordPress hosting provider, you can decide not to avail of a separate CDN solution. The company may already have an in-house CDN service with server-side content caching. If you're a blogger, this feature will suffice. However, you need to check with your web host if it has such a feature.
What Is BelugaCDN?
BelugaCDN operates similarly with Amazon ColdFront and Stackpath by using a global cloud to hasten the delivery of website content. It supports all TLS extensions and offers an excellent alternative if asset security is your topmost concern. However, unlike other CDN providers, BelugaCDN is affordable even for small website owners.
Why don't you check BelugaCDN's website to learn about the many features and characteristics of its services? We're sure you'll love that the company offers a free trial and monthly subscription sans the long-term contract.
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