Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a group of servers distributed across a region or globally that work collaboratively to accelerate the delivery of content on the web. The servers in a CDN temporarily store (or cache) webpage content such as images, HTML, JavaScript, and videos. They then deliver the cached content to users loading the webpage. Nowadays, virtually all websites and applications rely on CDN to assist in delivering content to their users.

Web applications utilize CDN primarily because it offers four significant benefits: improved performance, enhanced reliability, cost savings, and resilience against network attacks.

Performance

Faster performance is the primary reason why most individuals opt for CDN. Websites using CDN can reduce their loading time by up to 50%, and sometimes even more. CDN accelerates content delivery by shortening the distance between content storage and the destination, reducing file sizes for faster loading, and optimizing server infrastructure to respond to user requests more quickly.

Reliability

Servers can sometimes encounter issues, leading to network congestion, connection interruptions, and other problems. CDN ensures that web applications can provide uninterrupted service to users despite these issues. CDN balances network traffic loads, ensuring no single server is overwhelmed. If a single server goes down, CDN can initiate a “failover” process where backup servers take over.

Moreover, CDN comprises multiple servers distributed across numerous data centers, providing significant redundancy. If a server, data center, or entire data center region fails, CDN can still deliver content from other servers in the network.

Cost Savings

CDN primarily reduces expenses for website operators by reducing trips back and forth to the origin server. Since CDN caches most of the content on the website and serves it from the cache, the origin server doesn’t have to repeatedly deliver the same content.

Web hosting service providers typically charge websites for incoming and outgoing data from their web hosts. The more data transmitted, the higher the cost, often referred to as “bandwidth cost.” However, when CDN serves most of the website’s content on behalf of the origin server, there’s significantly less data to transmit, reducing the content output from the origin server and, consequently, bandwidth costs.

Resilience Against Attacks

CDN is particularly well-suited for protecting websites against Denial of Service (DoS) and Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. In these attacks, attackers flood websites with vast amounts of junk traffic, attempting to overload and crash them. With its numerous servers, CDN can absorb large volumes of traffic, even unnatural spikes from DDoS attacks, better than a single origin server, keeping the website online even during attacks.

In conclusion, these are the reasons and advantages of using CDN. If you’re interested in CDN, feel free to contact Ogcloud, as we offer cost-effective and high-performance services tailored to your needs.