Surely you have heard of a CDN or Content Delivery Network and they are responsible for ensuring that you can surf the Internet well and that the pages load quickly and instantly. You will not need them if you have a personal blog or a web page with few visits but they are totally recommended when launching an international web that we want to load correctly everywhere. That is why we compiled some of the most popular or well-known CDNs out there.
When choosing one or the other, we must take into account the price but also the services they offer
What is a CDN?
CDN is Content Delivery Network or, what is the same, a group of connected servers that are also considered content delivery networks or distribution networks. They are connected servers that allow us to bridge the distance to the main server to offer better traffic management since they have different locations in hundreds of countries or cities. They work as a geographically distributed network that allows you to access content quickly from anywhere in the world even if the page is at the other end.
That is, a CDN achieves that the traffic load on a website is alleviated , performance is improved, security against attacks is improved or loading times are reduced when browsing through said website. They are essential and their main fusion is to replicate the entire content or part of the content between these connected servers so that you can access the one closest to you and significantly reduce loading time or avoid saturation. They work with the main websites that we visit every day.
Best CDNs
Although there are many, there are some servers that are more recommended, better known or that are always at the top of the list when we must choose which one to bet on. It will depend on each need of each website or company or our public but there are some that are always a recommended option.
Cloudfare
Cloudafare has a network of servers in more than a hundred different countries, which makes it one of the most recommended options that we can consider. There are servers in more than a hundred cities around the world and we can see the detailed points from their website. In Spain, Cloudfare has offices in Madrid and Barcelona.
Cloudfare describes itself as a massive global data center network. It is a fully customizable CDN that allows you to choose what you need and what not, choose the page rules or have control over how the content is stored, etc. Its advantages include the greater bandwidth savings or the possibility of a detailed control of the caches to know what resources are stored or to have a control panel that offers us details about the performance as well as filters to have detail of everything what happens on the web.
It supports video services and also supports the HTTP / 3 protocol. As for video, it is compatible with files such as MPEG-DASH, HLS and CMAF. Also, it promises support for BYOIP addresses and has other features like support for China, for example. It also has extra or additional functions such as the ability to block bots or block spam, or it has control to block cyber attacks, which will improve the security of the website.
The price of Cloudfare depends on what we want to hire. There are free packages with no monthly cost but also other solutions with more options that are the ones that would interest us in this case, such as the Pro, Business or Enterprise package. The prices are $ 20 or $ 200 per month in the first two and the Enterprise plan does not have a fixed price, but you must ask for a quote.
Fastly
Another of the most popular CDNs in the world is Fastly . Like others on this list, it has several payment plans according to the needs we have and with a free trial period. We can choose the Essential, Professional or Enterprise plan. All of them designed for companies but we will choose one or the other depending on the size of the company or the audience we want to reach, for example.
Fastly has an infinite number of configuration options and another of its strengths is the possibility of choosing between different types of cache when generating videos. It is also the CDN used by pages such as Twitch , HBO or FuboTV, among others, and which allows them to work smoothly and without interruptions or interruptions regardless of where we consult them from. It is also behind others such as Hulu or international media such as The Guardian. CNN ,, The New York Times …
Transparent Edge CDN
Another of the best options when choosing a CDN. Among the clients that we find in this CDN are many of the essential Spanish websites such as RTVE, the Vocento group, Codere, the Spanish Association Against Cancer or the Funidelia or Agatha Ruiz de la Prada stores that also have this service.
In the Transparent Edge Service locations we see that the network has servers all over the world. In Spain there are offices in Madrid and Barcelona, but the network also has offices in Paris, Geneva, Zurich, Milan, London, New York, Washington DC, Chicago, etc.
The services are divided into five main categories such as content distribution, security, computing, access, platform management … Within each category or section we see the benefits and options that allow us, as we can check and consult in the following link.
It is a service that allows you to access a dashboard that allows you to see all the details of our services. In this panel or desktop we can see the performance metrics, geographic location filters or the services that we have contrasted or available to interact in real time or integrate other tools that are compatible with Transparent Edge, for example.
Akamai
Akamai is also another of the most important and with more options available although, like the previous one, it does not show its prices on the web but we must register and contact a consultant. You do not need a payment method to try it and it has a free 30-day option that we can try at no cost if we register on the web with some basic information: name, email and company. If we like it, we can contact you to choose a plan.
It is a network that has more than 1,400 options in different countries. In total, in more than 130 countries and with more than 300 Tbps of capacity. It has services and tools for account management, performance, online video, cloud computing.
Akamai has three different solutions that we can consult from its website: Aure Edge eXchange, Aura Control System and Akamai Federation. In content distribution, the possibility of offering high-quality videos, large file downloads, specific distribution or the possibility of analyzing the performance or participation of the users who use the CDN stands out.
Amazon CloudFront
AWS is Amazon’s division for cloud computing services, Amazon Web Services. And among the services and tools it offers we find Amazon CloudFront, the content delivery network or CDN. As they explain themselves on their website, it is “a fast content delivery network (CDN) service that distributes data, videos, applications and APIs to clients around the world in a secure way, with low latency, high transfer speeds and within an intuitive environment for developers ”
It has all kinds of benefits and advantages and also multiple uses. It is intended for streaming video on demand or for streaming live videos , for example. In addition, it also allows you to improve security or “speed up delivery” of the website by reducing the load on servers or improving latency.
There are many companies worldwide that use CloudFront as a CDN. From Amazon Prime Video itself to other successful companies like Slack , like King or Rovio. In addition to brands such as Canon, the Condé Nast medium or the Nextdoor company.
Prices vary depending on the country and depending on the data transfer but we can check them from the website. In addition, there is a layer of free use of AWS that allows us to start using Amazon CloudFront at no cost, although with limits such as 50 GB of data transfer or a maximum of two million HTTP or HTTPS requests, for example. We can also contact the company to have personalized prices.
