Definition: Content Delivery Network (CDN)

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A “Content Delivery Network (CDN)” is a global network of servers that are used to distribute and deliver digital content, such as websites, videos, images, and other multimedia assets. The main goal of a CDN is to reduce the latency and improve the performance of content delivery, especially for users who are accessing the content from far away or over a slow network connection.

A CDN works by replicating and storing copies of the content on multiple servers around the world, and then delivering the content from the nearest server to the user’s location. This helps to reduce the distance that the data needs to travel, and therefore reduces the amount of time it takes to load the content.

By using a CDN, website owners can improve the loading speed and overall performance of their website, reduce server load and bandwidth usage, and increase the reliability and scalability of their content delivery. CDNs are also useful for protecting against DDoS attacks, as the distributed nature of the network helps to absorb the traffic and prevent the origin server from being overwhelmed.

In summary, a CDN is a powerful tool for improving the speed, performance, and reliability of content delivery for websites, online applications, and other digital media.

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By Ashley Bryan

Ashley Bryan is an Internet Strategist and a SEO Consultant located on the Sunshine Coast in Australia with over 19 years' experience. He owns WebsiteStrategies which serves small to medium businesses in Australia and New Zealand. Follow him: Facebook LinkedIn Twitter