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Edge & networking
CDN
Caches static assets and media at edge locations close to users, offloading the origin.
When to use
- Images, video segments, JS/CSS
- Map tiles and other cacheable API responses
Pitfalls
- Cache invalidation is slow and costly; version URLs instead
- Personalised responses must not be cached publicly
Options by provider
The first option is what diagrams show for that provider.
Amazon Web Services
- Amazon CloudFrontManaged
Google Cloud
- Cloud CDNManaged
- Media CDN — built for large-scale videoManaged
Microsoft Azure
- Azure Front DoorManaged
Open source / self-hosted
- VarnishSelf-hosted
- Apache Traffic ServerSelf-hosted
Third-party (works with any cloud)
- CloudflareManaged
- FastlyManaged
- AkamaiManaged
Related concepts
Used in
- YouTube
- Video CDN — Serves manifests and video segments from edge caches near viewers
- Netflix
- Open Connect CDN — Netflix-owned caches inside ISPs that serve nearly all video bytes
- Instagram
- Image CDN — Serves photos and thumbnails from the edge
- Twitter / X
- Media CDN — Images, video and avatars
- WhatsApp / Messenger
- Media CDN — Downloads of popular attachments
- Amazon
- CDN — Product images and static assets
- URL shortener
- Edge cache — Caches popular redirects close to visitors
- Search autocomplete
- Edge cache — Caches suggestions for very common short prefixes
- Pastebin
- CDN — Caches raw paste text at the edge
- Google Maps
- Tile CDN — Serves map tiles from the edge
- BookMyShow
- CDN — Posters, trailers and static pages
- Airbnb
- Photo CDN — Listing photos in many sizes
- NoBroker
- Photo CDN — Listing photos
- Zomato / food delivery
- CDN — Menu and dish photos
- Quora
- CDN — Images and static assets
- LinkedIn
- CDN — Profile photos and media
- Live sports scores
- CDN — Short-TTL snapshots for page loads