Cloudflare vs Netlify

This article will explore the differences and similarities between Cloudflare and Netlify.

Cloudflare is a San Francisco-based web performance and security company. It provides a content delivery network, DDoS protection, and serverless solutions. It has a free tier, prices start at $20/mo, and has customers like Hubspot, IBM, and Shopify.

Netlify is a San Francisco-based serverless platform. It provides web deployment, git-based workflow, and automated deployments. It has a free tier, prices start at $19/mo, and has customers like Twilio, MailChimp, and Danone.

Continue reading as we compare the features and advantages of both of these platforms so that you can make an informed decision.

What is Cloudflare?

One of the most popular names in web security, Cloudflare also offers web infrastructure services in the form of content delivery networks and DDoS mitigation services among others.

By using its global network of data centers, Cloudflare improves the site performance and speeds up loading times. It essentially works like a giant VPN, protecting your data against threats like SQL injection and identity theft.

Cloudflare Core Features 

• API-first approach

Customers utilizing the Cloudflare CDN can easily automate workflows with highly granular control over content caching and purging. The API-first approach allows developers to customize the caching based on the needs of the application, ensuring constant and reliable delivery every time.

• HTTP/3 support

Instead of using the TCP transport layer, Cloudflare uses HTTP/3 that utilizes a pre-encrypted QUIC layer, therefore accelerating content delivery to the incoming traffic. Therefore, customers can enjoy faster and more secure connections to the web and APIs.

• Bring your own IP

BYOIP support in Cloudflare ensures that when you introduce new IPs, your customers are securely and seamlessly transitioned to the new IP, without your ISP treating it as a new request. Having your own IP announced by Cloudflare guarantees deliverability, inboxing, and maximum customer satisfaction during such transitions.

Cloudflare Advantages 

• Highly customizable CDN

Due to its unique architecture, Cloudflare extends advanced control over how the content is cached and purged on the network. The Cache API improves the cache hit ratio of your website with advanced routing and URL canonicalization. With Page Rules, you can specify the behavior of individual URLs, like how they will be cached and for how long.

• Granular cache visibility

Cloudflare brings advanced actionable visibility into the cache of your website. You can see exactly what resources are being cached, allowing you to change the configurations to improve the cache hit ratios. The website performance will be neatly summarized on a dashboard, where you can filter by hostname and see the top URLs that missed cache.

• Bandwidth savings

Caching content on Cloudflare CDN minimizes bandwidth consumption as it serves static content from its global network of datacenters. Since Cloudflare offers predictable bandwidth pricing, customers hosting on this platform can partly reduce or completely eliminate data egress costs for dynamic content requests.

What is Netlify? 

Netlify is a holistic cloud computing platform offering hosting and serverless backend services for static websites and progressive web applications.

Netlify Edge is similar to a CDN but comes with advanced features, offering fast and reliable web delivery from global edge locations. It also offers other features for the customers like form processing, split testing, serverless functions, etc.

Netlify Core Features 

• Git integrated CI/CD

Being a holistic cloud computing platform, various apps from Netlify integrate with each other to automate the development, testing, and deploying processes. You can go straight from Git to global deployment without managing web servers or other backend infrastructure.

• Simultaneous deployment

Customers caching their content on Netlify get a single repository from where they can write and manage everything about their static websites like frontend builds, serverless code, and edge routing logic.

Moreover, each deployment updates all the code and assets simultaneously and all the previous versions remain available at their permanent URLs.

• Programmable edge logic

With Netlify, you can run custom code from within the network edge without compromising the performance. You can modify each request to authenticate visitors, serve relevant banner ads, localize the content, etc. 

Netlify Advantages 

• No maintenance windows

On Netlify Edge, every global deployment is an instant atomic update, meaning all the codes and assets for your application are simultaneously updated.

Cache invalidations happen instantly, allowing customers to host richer applications than a standard CDN. Therefore, you can deploy updated codes multiple times throughout the day without the risk of partial or broken deploys, stale content, lengthy maintenance windows, etc.

• Better control over content requests

Netlify also offers a simple text-based configuration that the customers can use to customize how the platform will handle network requests inside the Git repository.

You can set up custom location-based redirects, apply custom headers, etc. Moreover, you can integrate a legacy blog, remote APIs, and new pages into a single domain using Netlify’s powerful proxy capabilities.

• Security features

Netlify also allows customers to use third-party proxy services or their own infrastructure for advanced protection. Moreover, you can easily hide a part or all of your website behind a password, that can be easily configured in the Netlify Dashboard.

You can restrict access to certain paths in your application to a custom userbase with Netlify Identity or a third-party authentication provider.

Cloudflare vs Netlify Comparison

FAQ