Content Delivery Network CDN

Content Delivery Network is a globally distributed cache layer that sits between your origin server and your visitors. When someone in another part of the country (or world) requests your site, the CDN serves cached copies of static assets from a nearby edge location — typically 10-100 ms instead of 200-500 ms across the country.

What a CDN actually does

• Caches static assets — images, CSS, JavaScript, fonts, sometimes full HTML pages — at hundreds of edge locations
• Compresses on the fly — Brotli or gzip for text, modern image formats (WebP, AVIF) for visuals
• Absorbs traffic spikes — most requests never reach your origin, so a viral moment doesn’t crush your server
• Mitigates DDoS — volumetric attacks get absorbed at the edge network’s massive capacity rather than reaching a single origin
• Provides analytics — request volume, geography, bot detection, cache hit ratio
• TLS termination — handles HTTPS at the edge, including modern protocols (HTTP/3, post-quantum key exchange) regardless of what your origin supports

CDN options at SMB scale

• Cloudflare — generous free tier, deep WAF + bot management on paid tiers, our preferred default
• SiteGround built-in CDN — included with WordPress hosting plans, works automatically with no setup
• AWS CloudFront — tightly integrated with the AWS stack; pay-as-you-go
• Bunny.net, Fastly, KeyCDN — alternatives with different pricing and feature mixes

Beyond performance — why CDN matters for security

A modern CDN is also your first line of network security. Cloudflare in front of an origin server hides the origin IP, terminates TLS, runs the WAF, challenges suspicious traffic, and absorbs DDoS — all before requests reach your application. For most SMB sites, the CDN does more security work than any other single layer.