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Fastly vs Windows Azure CDN comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

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
Sponsored
Ranking in CDN
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
79
Ranking in other categories
WAN Optimization (4th), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (2nd), Managed DNS (1st), Domain Name System (DNS) Security (5th), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (17th)
Fastly
Ranking in CDN
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (21st), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (9th)
Windows Azure CDN
Ranking in CDN
10th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the CDN category, the mindshare of Cloudflare is 15.8%, down from 21.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fastly is 5.5%, up from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Windows Azure CDN is 2.9%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
CDN Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cloudflare15.8%
Fastly5.5%
Windows Azure CDN2.9%
Other75.8%
CDN
 

Featured Reviews

M.A. Faisal - PeerSpot reviewer
General Manager at bKash Limited
Advanced protection has secured critical web workloads and provides clear traffic visibility
From a security perspective, there remains a security loophole, as some browsers in the market can bypass the Turnstile solution, which requires approximately 40 seconds to do so. From a performance perspective, this is acceptable. We also tried Google reCAPTCHA, and that can also be bypassed. From a security perspective, I would say neither solution is completely secured. Regarding uptime, we have faced a couple of incidents due to Cloudflare in recent years, so I cannot say we receive 100% uptime for our region. We sometimes face challenges, including downtime and other issues. As a result, we are not receiving 100% uptime from Cloudflare's solution. Since most of our customers are in this region, we need alternatives. We need something more competitive than Cloudflare. Unfortunately, in Bangladesh, Cloudflare has three points of presence already, and we cannot find any other solution provider in Bangladesh as an alternative, which presents another challenge. Competitor solutions have more attack signatures, which ensure better security compared to Cloudflare's predefined configurations. Customers do not have options to modify any configuration parameters in Cloudflare, whereas other competitor solutions, such as F5 Distributed Cloud, allow customers to tune configurations according to their requirements. Cloudflare could improve in this area. Additionally, regarding visibility, Cloudflare has static visibility, but they could adopt dynamic graph features for their customers.
Pranay Jain - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Software Developer at hireHQ
Edge caching has transformed response times and delivers faster candidate data globally
Fastly can be improved in certain areas such as VCL, which is powerful but has a steep learning curve for normal users. A more user-friendly, UI-based configuration could simplify the experience, alongside better templates for common use cases and dashboard improvements, as the current dashboard feels complex for beginners, and pricing can be hard to predict for smaller companies. I chose 8 out of 10 because it has excellent performance and low latency delivery, making it suitable for larger applications, with strong Edge Caching and instant purging capabilities. However, VCL complexity and pricing predictability, especially for smaller companies, along with a user-friendly dashboard are areas impacting my score.
reviewer2273484 - PeerSpot reviewer
Pre Sales at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
Has provided exceptional performance for handling high web traffic
In my opinion, Windows Azure CDN is one of the best CDNs. We tried to replace it and made a business case to check other options such as Cloudflare, and we are using Cloudflare and tried Akamai, wanting to explore alternatives from OCI. One of the best features of Windows Azure CDN is that it has integrated WAF; it is not only CDN alone and it is a very smart and capable WAF. Windows Azure CDN is easily integrated with Azure services such as Azure Storage and Azure Web Apps, and sometimes we are using just Azure Front Door while the back end and database will be on OCI. The impact of Windows Azure CDN's dynamic content acceleration on our application performance is very significant. For one of our clients, we could not use anything other than Azure Front Door.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The initial setup is extremely easy but will require access to your Domain Name Servers."
"New and innovative way to protect the client's data."
"The UI is good."
"The most valuable feature of Cloudflare is that it has a free version. They give us the free version with the anti-DDoS features and also the load balancing solution."
"Cloudflare has made management of my website much easier by combining various functions in one platform without compromising quality."
"What I like best about Cloudflare is that my company can use it to trace and manage applications and monitor traffic. The solution tells you if there's a spike in traffic. Cloudflare also sends you a link to check your equipment and deployment and track it through peering, so it's a valuable tool."
"DDoS protection is this product’s most valuable feature."
"It's very user-friendly."
"Initially, we faced load time issues, but after deploying Fastly and optimizing our queries, we achieved a response time cut to less than 1 millisecond from an initial 3 to 4 seconds."
"Rate limiting is a good feature that protects from volumetric attacks."
"Its initial setup process is straightforward."
"The product helps our organization to access sites located in different regions quickly."
"Compute@Edge features are valuable to me."
"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."
"Fastly uses configuration versioning, where you can deploy a new version in less than one minute."
"Fastly provides CDN, WAF, image optimization, and IP restriction."
"We use the product for faster content delivery with low latency."
"The most valuable feature of Windows Azure CDN is its effectiveness."
"The UI is very intuitive."
"The geolocation feature is very important because many colleagues travel worldwide and need to access information from anywhere. The product has improved security."
"One of the best features of Windows Azure CDN is that it has integrated WAF; it is not only CDN alone and it is a very smart and capable WAF."
"One of the most valuable aspects is the capability to store extensive datasets and objects in the cloud, enabling their download through shared access signatures."
"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that one can access Windows Azure CDN from anywhere."
"I enjoy engaging in discussions with colleagues possessing unique expertise. I leverage the three platforms—Azure, Google, and AWS extensively. This allows me to offer diverse solutions to customers, commonly referred to as a multi-cloud approach."
 

Cons

"The tool needs to improve caching of servers. The product needs to include PFX certificate as well."
"It would be good if Cloudflare could have more servers for better traffic routing or an increase in the traffic routed. This is what I'd like to improve in Cloudflare."
"Regarding uptime, we have faced a couple of incidents due to Cloudflare in recent years, so I cannot say we receive 100% uptime for our region."
"We're facing challenges due to an upgrade in the machine learning model. The problem arises from some users abusing the APIs, resulting in an influx of suspicious traffic. Cloudflare's learning model mistakenly identifies this traffic as human. Consequently, it assigns it a higher trust score, akin to legitimate human traffic, causing complications in our architecture. Previously, such traffic would have been categorized as suspicious, enabling us to apply appropriate blocking rules. However, we encounter difficulties distinguishing between genuine and suspicious traffic with the new categorization. Despite these challenges, overall, Cloudflare remains the preferred solution compared to Azure, AWS CloudFront, and Google Cloud Armor."
"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."
"The Always Online feature has room for improvement. It seems to work sometimes and not others even with the pro version."
"Cloudflare's free plan is limited to 5,000 records for their free plan. They should increase that. For example, if I create a domain called abc.com and a subdomain called a.abc.com, my record count will be two. I can make a maximum of 5,000 subdomains. However, if we use our own DNS hosted on another provider, there is no limit. Their free plan also lacks name server customization."
"Honestly the product has not really improved the way of my organisation."
"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."
"I think Fastly could improve by improving the documentation and having some code examples so that it is easier for developers, since at the beginning it becomes a bit complicated."
"It's not easy to start with Fastly if you don't have VCL knowledge, so it appears very complex at the beginning."
"We are not getting quick responses from Fastly technical support engineers. Sometimes they depend on their D3 developers."
"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."
"Fastly can be improved in certain areas such as VCL, which is powerful but has a steep learning curve for normal users."
"The product should provide improved bot detection and management."
"What I don't like about Fastly is that they charge a heavy price."
"The solution’s pricing could be improved."
"They should include configuration for cache rules."
"Exploring shared access solutions with cloud accounts would be a beneficial choice."
"Windows Azure CDN should lower its prices."
"The high price of Windows Azure CDN is an area of concern where improvements can be made."
"I believe Windows Azure CDN can improve monitoring and measuring overall end-user performance. Providing monitoring tools or agents that can be integrated into our pages would be highly beneficial. Setting up a custom domain with Windows Azure CDN involves proving domain ownership, which can take some time. The process is relatively straightforward if your DNS or domain registrar is already integrated with Microsoft. However, the verification process may be more time-consuming if you use a different service provider."
"The response time of the support team must be improved."
"We have experienced issues with switch connectivity."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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 solution has many features but there are ones that you need to pay for. Sometimes you have to find out which is available for free and which you have to pay for."
"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."
"For Cloudflare, I recommend it heavily for small businesses with revenue under a couple of million dollars. Onboarding is easy, and they even have a free plan. This makes it simple for businesses in the $100,000-$500,000 range to try it out and see its value, allowing them to scale up their infrastructure as needed."
"The tool is a premium product, so it is very expensive."
"The pricing for the service is reasonable, neither excessively cheap nor prohibitively expensive. It aligns well with the value of their solution."
"So far I use free tier and happy with it. You can subscribe to business package if needed."
"The pricing depends on the usage, but the cheapest would be around 5,000 USD a month."
"It is an expensive solution."
"In my opinion, Fastly is priced competitively."
"Fastly is less expensive than one of its competitors."
"You need to pay a premium price for the tool."
"The solution is cheaper than other products in the market."
"The pricing has been very competitive."
"I've generally found Fastly to be very competitive in pricing, especially around Compute@Edge."
"It comes at a relatively affordable cost."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten."
"The pricing of the solution depends on usage and varies based on the company's needs. If you want additional features like advanced logging, it will be pricier. However, it could be cheaper if you don't need those features. It all depends on the resources and requirements."
"The pricing is extremely high, almost 9 out of 10."
"The tool's pricing is cheap."
"The tool's pricing is cheap."
"The solution's price depends on how much traffic you have. So, it was okay for us. Payments are to be made on a monthly basis since one has to pay for what they used."
"I rate the price of Windows Azure CDN a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is high."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise26
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise6
 

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...
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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cloudflare DNS?
The pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Cloudflare are a bit on the higher side overall.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fastly?
The pricing of Fastly can be hard to predict because it is primarily usage-based with minimal setup costs and flexibl...
What needs improvement with Fastly?
Fastly can be improved in certain areas such as VCL, which is powerful but has a steep learning curve for normal user...
What is your primary use case for Fastly?
Fastly serves as an Edge Cloud platform and CDN that we use for real-time Edge Caching and instant caching purging, a...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Windows Azure CDN?
In terms of pricing for Windows Azure CDN and the whole Microsoft products, you cannot compare networking alone or co...
What needs improvement with Windows Azure CDN?
It is not a weakness of Windows Azure CDN; rather, it is the fact that it is outside Saudi Arabia, leading to some re...
What is your primary use case for Windows Azure CDN?
We are using Windows Azure CDN, Azure AI capability for a translator, Azure Front Door for CDN, and from Microsoft's ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS
No data available
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.
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
NORAD, Agreeya Mobility
Find out what your peers are saying about Fastly vs. Windows Azure CDN and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,228 professionals have used our research since 2012.