Amazon CloudFront vs Fastly comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Fastly are both solutions in the CDN category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.3, while Fastly is ranked #8 with an average rating of 9.0. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 7.2% mindshare in CDN, compared to Fastly’s 5.3% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Fastly users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

Amazon CloudFront and Fastly compete in the CDN market, each offering unique strengths. Amazon CloudFront is favored for its deep AWS integration, while Fastly's real-time capabilities provide a competitive advantage for those prioritizing speed.

Features: Amazon CloudFront offers robust DDoS protection, seamless AWS service integration, and latency reduction through its edge locations. Fastly is known for edge computing capabilities, impressive speed optimization, and its powerful VCL for configuration management.

Room for Improvement: Amazon CloudFront could benefit from faster configuration adjustments, enhanced support for non-AWS environments, and more transparent logging features. Fastly might improve by offering better zero-trust solutions, simplifying its user interface, and providing more comprehensive reporting tools.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Amazon CloudFront's integration with AWS simplifies deployment and is supported by a knowledgeable team, enhancing user experience for AWS clients. Fastly offers flexibility and rapid deployment configurations but may require more technical expertise, with a responsive support system aiding this process.

Pricing and ROI: Amazon CloudFront provides a predictable pricing structure suitable for AWS-integrated businesses looking for cost transparency. Fastly’s pricing is flexible and can be economically favorable for scalable solutions, appealing to businesses that require performance adjustments despite potential cost variability.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon CloudFront vs. Fastly Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon CloudFront vs. Fastly

December 2025

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Helped 879,259 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Cloudflare

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the CDN category, the mindshare of Cloudflare is 20.0%, down from 21.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Amazon CloudFront is 7.2%, down from 9.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fastly is 5.3%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

CDN Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Cloudflare	20.0%
Amazon CloudFront	7.2%
Fastly	5.3%
Other	67.5%

CDN

Featured Reviews

Herb Angle

Owner at Hga consulting

Has helped manage client domains with streamlined access control and threat visibility

I don't know what areas could be improved with Cloudflare WAF; Cloudflare is constantly improving and adding features to their feature set. They're doing a good job, and as far as DNS and support for any domains that I create or my clients create, it's mandatory for me to make sure that they have Cloudflare as their DNS provider. The Cloudflare load balancing capability hasn't really helped in enhancing my website's uptime and resiliency because we don't really get that much traffic; it's mostly remote users, and web hosting is done by a web hosting service. It doesn't pay to try to host your own website.

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Nicolas Forgues

Head of Data & Content at a transportation company with 10,001+ employees

Improved web performance has boosted content customization and currently delivers faster user experiences

From my perspective, I see some weaknesses in Amazon CloudFront; I would rate the product something around nine out of ten, but there are disadvantages compared to its competitors. Talking specifically about Amazon CloudFront, I think they could have some additional features in the future, and I believe they may lack certain functionalities.

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Patel Parth

Technical support engineer at Adobe

Optimized ecommerce performance and improved access control through image handling and IP filtering

I believe that Fastly should provide guidelines for their WAF blocking rules. It should be public what the rules are that are blocking their contents. I believe Fastly should provide regional IP addresses instead of POP IPs. Fastly should provide features similar to Cloudflare regarding a block list. Additionally, a POP address should be there with a wide range of IP addresses provided, public static IP addresses, so customers can integrate egress IPs. Fastly should provide WebP image processing on the backend instead of on the fly. It would be a very useful feature to avoid unnecessary time for browser to browser and local cookies. I believe that Fastly service has a few gaps. We are not getting quick responses from Fastly technical support engineers. Sometimes they depend on their D3 developers. There should be transparency.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The tool is user-friendly."

"Cloudflare offers CDN and DDoS protection. We have the front end, API, and database in how you structure applications."

"Cloudflare allows us to self-host services such as Rocket.Chat and Node-RED, in high-availability mode, thanks to round robin DNS which allows us to share one hostname between our two locations."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is external DNS. It is also very secure. They have their own main server and once you configure it, the product takes care of everything. There are no issues in resolving IPs and low latency is also present."

"Easier http to https redirect using page rules"

"I get a lot of value from Cloudflare's API because it enables you to build a separate environment inside the solution. You can create a domain for performing test requests before you move to the production environment and connect various domains."

"Centralized, full-featured DNS."

"Cloudflare DNS is widely used, and it's good for websites. If we use Cloudflare DNS and update one record, it updates in their office instantly."

More Cloudflare pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution is the speed of delivery."

"The most beneficial aspect of Amazon CloudFront is its capacity to automatically arrange resources depending on user needs, eliminating the need for on-premises management."

"Amazon CloudFront is a stable solution."

"This scalability has positively reflected in my customer's web performance and user experience, allowing for better loading times."

"Hosting static content or with engineering dynamic content is beneficial."

"The product is very well interconnected with other Amazon services."

"The distribution aspect of CloudFront and its ability to reduce latency are most beneficial."

"It has built-in DDoS protection, which protects against DDoS attacks."

More Amazon CloudFront pros

"Compute@Edge features are valuable to me."

"Its initial setup process is straightforward."

"Fastly uses configuration versioning, where you can deploy a new version in less than one minute."

"The product helps our organization to access sites located in different regions quickly."

"The product's initial setup phase is straightforward."

"Rate limiting is a good feature that protects from volumetric attacks."

"Fastly combines both the CDN side and the Signal Sciences next-generation WAF, which is closely integrated with the CDN, allowing us to use both products seamlessly."

"Support is good; the product works as advertised. We have a Slack connection with them. So we can basically ask for help, live, engage, and ring when they respond. Very quickly."

More Fastly pros

Cons

"I believe they currently have this feature, but there will most likely be integration with APIs so we can control some features through API."

"It would be beneficial for us if Cloudflare could offer a scrubbing solution. This would involve taking a snapshot of my website and keeping it live during a DDoS attack, ensuring uninterrupted service for our users. DDoS attacks are typically short in duration, and having Cloudflare maintain the site's availability from its secure network would enhance the overall user experience. I would appreciate it if Cloudflare could consider implementing this feature. Many organizations already utilize similar capabilities in their CDN platforms, where a static snapshot of the web page is displayed during DDoS attacks. In terms of features, Cloudflare needs to enhance its resilience and stay more focused on adopting new technologies. For instance, solutions like F5 XC Box, Access Solution, and Distributed Cloud Solution have impressive features, and Cloudflare should strive to match and exceed those capabilities. There's a need for improvement in areas like AI-based DDoS attacks and Layer 7 WAF features. Cloudflare should prioritize enhancements in areas such as behavioral DDoS and protection against SQL injection attacks, considering the prevalent trend of public exposure to the internet for business reasons. Overall, Cloudflare needs to invest more in advancing its feature set."

"We are a product integrator and reseller, and we would like to have a better partner relationship, similar to a channel sales relationship. Sometimes we are on our own or get diverted by Cloudflare because they have direct sales, which competes with us and makes it difficult to build a relationship with this company since we want to be an MSP or a managed service provider for the solution."

"Cloudflare could be improved by introducing a mid-tier pricing option."

"Latencies are always a problem."

"One area of improvement is in the Access Rules. Hypothetically, if we wanted to block or challenge traffic outside of the United States, the only way to currently do that (as far as I know) is to enter every single country outside of the United States. That could be a labor intensive job. A solution could be to enable users to create a rule where traffic is only allowed within a certain country."

"The timing aspect can lead to it being considered overpriced. This is a particular concern we have with Cloudflare, as they may struggle with accurately detecting the client."

"There might be helpful if there was some web application firewall feature."

More Cloudflare cons

"The support must be improved."

"AWS is redesigning its user interface and user experience for CloudFront, and there is room for improvement in certificate management."

"The user interface could be improved."

"A lot of caching features must be added to the solution."

"The product could support any network load balancer. At present, we can use only Amazon’s load balancer application."

"The lack of seamless integration made the setup process more complex and required additional research to manage all the services properly."

"It might benefit from multi-region support to enhance performance."

"The solution could be more simplified for new users. It could be more user-friendly."

More Amazon CloudFront cons

"The solution's pricing could be better."

"Support is not that great."

"The product should provide improved bot detection and management."

"What I don't like about Fastly is that they charge a heavy price."

"Stronger analytics would be helpful, like showing configurations that haven't served a certain amount of traffic in a while. With many properties, things can get lost track of - duplicates or unused configurations not properly decommissioned."

"We are not getting quick responses from Fastly technical support engineers. Sometimes they depend on their D3 developers."

"It is missing a "staging" platform to deploy a test configuration with all of the real settings, which would allow us to properly test before putting it into production."

"Fastly's customer service area needs improvement."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I give the price a five out of ten."

"I believe their performance has improved, but I'd like to refrain from discussing the pricing aspect related to the cloud. The pricing, in my opinion, could be simplified, and I think they should consider reevaluating the pricing for support, as it can be quite high. At times, this cost can make it challenging to choose CARFAGuard or opt for the support."

"The product's pricing is cheap."

"I think the pricing is competitive. I think as far as licensing is concerned it's pretty straightforward because it's based on domain. It's just that sometimes domains could be tricky with some customers."

"It's a premium model. You can start at zero and work your way up to the enterprise model, which has a very high pricing level."

"So far I use free tier and happy with it. You can subscribe to business package if needed."

"There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees."

"When you compare Cloudflare DNS to other solutions, such as Akamai, the price is reasonable."

More Cloudflare pricing and cost advice

"Amazon's pricing varies depending on the data transfer."

"I used to work with AWS and Azure, and we provided cost comparisons for customers to help them choose the right services. Azure tends to be more user-friendly and easier to understand, while AWS may take more time."

"Amazon CloudFront is an expensive solution."

"The tool is affordable."

"Amazon CloudFront costs less than third-party services."

"The product has a mid-range pricing."

"Its price is really on the high side. It should be cheaper in general."

"The solution’s price is reasonable."

More Amazon CloudFront pricing and cost advice

"In my opinion, Fastly is priced competitively."

"The solution is cheaper than other products in the market."

"It is an expensive solution."

"You need to pay a premium price for the tool."

"I've generally found Fastly to be very competitive in pricing, especially around Compute@Edge."

"The pricing has been very competitive."

"Fastly is less expensive than one of its competitors."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

12%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	46
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	25

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	21
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	16

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Large Enterprise	5

Questions from the Community

Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?

Cloudflare. We are moving from Akamai prolexic to Cloudflare. Cloudflare anycast network outperforms Akamai static GR...

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Which would you choose - Cloudflare DNS or Quad9?

Cloudflare DNS is a very fast, very reliable public DNS resolver. It is an enterprise-grade authoritative DNS service...

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What do you like most about Cloudflare?

Cloudflare offers CDN and DDoS protection. We have the front end, API, and database in how you structure applications.

See all answers

How do I choose between AWS Global Accelerator and Amazon CloudFront?

Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether Amazon’s Web Service Global Accelerator or Amazon CloudFro...

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What do you like most about Amazon CloudFront?

The solution has good security features.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon CloudFront?

I find Amazon's pricing good, rating it eight out of ten and considering it affordable and rightly placed, not expens...

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What do you like most about Fastly?

Support is good; the product works as advertised. We have a Slack connection with them. So we can basically ask for h...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fastly?

You need to pay a premium price for the tool.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Fastly?

I believe that Fastly should provide guidelines for their WAF blocking rules. It should be public what the rules are ...

See all answers

Comparisons

Quad9 vs Cloudflare

Compared 52% of the time

Akamai vs Cloudflare

Compared 4% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Cloudflare

Compared 3% of the time

Myra Security DDoS Protection vs Cloudflare

Compared 2% of the time

Google Cloud DNS vs Cloudflare

Compared 1% of the time

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Azure Front Door vs Amazon CloudFront

Compared 42% of the time

Akamai vs Amazon CloudFront

Compared 12% of the time

Windows Azure CDN vs Amazon CloudFront

Compared 6% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Amazon CloudFront

Compared 4% of the time

AWS Global Accelerator vs Amazon CloudFront

Compared 4% of the time

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Akamai vs Fastly

Compared 22% of the time

Imperva Application Security Platform vs Fastly

Compared 6% of the time

Cloudflare Web Application Firewall vs Fastly

Compared 5% of the time

Azure Front Door vs Fastly

Compared 5% of the time

Uplynk vs Fastly

Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cloudflare

December 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Amazon CloudFront

December 2025

Download Amazon CloudFront product report

Buyer's Guide

Fastly

December 2025

Download Fastly product report

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS

No data available

Overview

Cloudflare enhances web performance and security with features like CDN caching and DDoS mitigation while providing easy DNS management and intuitive setup through its user-friendly dashboard.

Cloudflare is recognized for its comprehensive web security and performance solutions. Speed improvements are achieved through caching mechanisms and DDoS protection, combining ease of DNS management with flexible page rules. The robust analytics and threat insight tools provide valuable data, assisted by a user-friendly dashboard allowing quick setup and configuration. An API offers dynamic DNS settings ensuring low latency and high performance across the globe.

What are Cloudflare's key features?

CDN Caching: Enhances website speed through content delivery network caching.
Web Application Firewall: Protects websites from online threats.
DDoS Mitigation: Shields against distributed denial-of-service attacks.
DNS Management: Offers easy-to-use and flexible domain management.
SSL Certificates: Ensures secure connections between users and servers.
Analytics: Provides insights with robust analytics tools.

What benefits and ROI should users evaluate?

Enhanced Security: Strengthening web security with DDoS and firewall protection.
Speed Improvement: Faster content delivery with CDN caching.
Operational Simplicity: Simplifies website optimization through a user-friendly interface.
Scalable Solutions: Scales with global reach, lowering latency for improved performance.
Cost Efficiency: Offers layers of valuable functionality with pricing options.

Cloudflare finds utility across industries for DNS management and defense mechanisms. Its content delivery network assures fast content distribution and fortified security. Businesses integrate features like web application firewalls, load balancing, end-to-end SSL, and zero trust to protect websites from cyber threats while ensuring resilience and reliable performance.

Cloudflare

Amazon CloudFront is a global content delivery network (CDN) service that accelerates delivery of your websites, APIs, video content or other web assets. It integrates with other Amazon Web Services products to give developers and businesses an easy way to accelerate content to end users with no minimum usage commitments. Amazon CloudFront can be used to deliver your entire website, including dynamic, static, streaming, and interactive content using a global network of edge locations. Requests for your content are automatically routed to the nearest edge location, so content is delivered with the best possible performance. Amazon CloudFront is optimized to work with other Amazon Web Services, like Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), Amazon Elastic Load Balancing, and Amazon Route 53. Amazon CloudFront also works seamlessly with any non-AWS origin server, which stores the original, definitive versions of your files. Like other Amazon Web Services products, there are no long-term contracts or minimum monthly usage commitments for using Amazon CloudFront – you pay only for as much or as little content as you actually deliver through the content delivery service.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Fastly helps the world’s most popular digital businesses keep pace with their customer expectations by delivering fast, secure, and scalable online experiences. Businesses trust Fastly’s edge cloud platform to accelerate the pace of technical innovation, mitigate evolving threats, and scale on demand.

Fastly

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.

Unilever, Spotify, Pinterest, MLB Advanced Media, Foursquare, PBS, Airbnb, Netflix, WIX, Comcast, Automobili Lamborghini, Rovio, Discovery Communications

Twitter, Airbnb, Alaska Airlines, Pinterest, Vimeo, The Guardian, The New York Times, Ticketmaster, The Drupal Association, Opera, about.com, imgur, Etsy, Foursquare, GitHub, New Relic, shopify, Shazam, Firebase

Buyer's Guide

Amazon CloudFront vs. Fastly

December 2025

Free Report: Amazon CloudFront vs. Fastly

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon CloudFront vs. Fastly and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.

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