What are the advantages and disadvantages of using a content delivery network (CDN)?

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ACP picture ACP · Jan 27, 2010 · Viewed 32k times · Source

I was going through Best Practices for Speeding Up Your Web Site from developer site of Yahoo...

  • What are the advantages and disadvantages of using a content delivery network (CDN)?

  • When to use a CDN?

  • Is a CDN a performance booster?

Answer

Daniel Vassallo picture Daniel Vassallo · Jan 27, 2010

What are the advantages and disadvantages of using a content delivery network (CDN)?

  • The disadvantages may be that it costs money, and it adds a bit of complexity to your deployment procedures.

  • The main advantage is an increase in the speed with which the content is delivered to the users.

When to use a CDN?

  • It will be most effective when you have a popular public website with some type of static content (images, scripts, CSS, etc.).

Is a CDN a performance booster?

  • In general, yes. When a specific request is made by a user, the server closest to that user (in terms of the minimum number of nodes between the server and the user) is dynamically determined. This optimizes the speed with which the content is delivered to that user.

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