A content delivery network (CDN) is a group of globally-dispersed servers that work in unison to speed up the delivery of content on the web. Images, HTML, JavaScript and other content is temporarily stored (or cached) on the servers in a CDN so that when a user loads a webpage, the content can be delivered instantly.
The popular video sharing site YouTube is a good example of a how a content delivery network (CDN) helps to speed up content delivery and reduce latency. Millions of hours of content are streamed every day through YouTube, and a CDN is used to cache content and deliver it to multiple users without delay or loss of performance. Cloudways has partnered with Cloudflare, a popular CDN which powers millions of websites and offers entreprise-grade performance and security through its Cloudflare Enterprise add-on.
By employing multiple servers that are spread across the globe, a CDN improves the overall speed and performance of a website or application, keeping downtime to a minimum and maintaining performance even during heavy traffic spikes. In terms of security, a CDN also provides essential protection from attacks like distributed denial-of-service (DDoS).
A CDN is fundamentally a network of connected servers that facilitate the distribution of content as rapidly, affordably, consistently and securely as feasible. A CDN will set up servers at the junctions where various networks meet in order to increase speed and connectivity. These Internet exchange points (IXPs) serve as the main hubs where various internet service providers connect to share access to traffic coming from their own networks. A CDN provider can reduce costs and increase data delivery speeds by having a connection to these high-speed, interconnected locations.
