What is a CDN and what are the benefits?

CDN stands for Content Delivery Network. It is a system of servers distributed around the world to optimise the delivery of digital content, such as images, videos and other static or dynamic web content.

The benefits of a CDN include:

  1. Faster load times: as content is stored on different servers spread around the world, it can be quickly delivered to users from the nearest server, resulting in faster load times and a better user experience.
  2. Improved performance: CDNs can help reduce the load on your native web server, which can lead to improved performance and reduced risk of server overload.
  3. Higher reliability: if your site is hosted on a single server, a failure or maintenance issue may cause your site to go offline temporarily. With a CDN, there are multiple servers to distribute the load, resulting in higher reliability and uptime.
  4. Better security: some CDNs offer additional security features such as DDoS protection and web application firewalls to protect your site from malicious activity.

In short, a CDN can help improve the performance, reliability and security of your website and optimise the user experience.