CDN
A Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a geographically distributed network of servers that work together to deliver web content—such as HTML pages, JavaScript files, stylesheets, images, and videos—to users based on their location. It caches content at edge servers closer to end-users, reducing latency, improving load times, and enhancing reliability by distributing traffic across multiple servers. CDNs are widely used to optimize performance, handle traffic spikes, and provide security features like DDoS protection.
Developers should use a CDN when building websites or applications that require fast, reliable content delivery to a global audience, such as e-commerce sites, media streaming platforms, or SaaS products. It is essential for reducing page load times, which directly impacts user experience and SEO rankings, and for scaling to handle high traffic volumes without overloading origin servers. CDNs also offer security benefits, including SSL/TLS encryption and mitigation of common web attacks.