Get to know - What is Amazon CloudFront?

Get to know - What is Amazon CloudFront?

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4 min read

What is CloudFront?

Amazon CloudFront is a fast content delivery network (CDN) service that securely delivers data, videos, applications, and APIs to customers worldwide with low latency and high transfer speeds, all while remaining developer-friendly

Amazon CloudFront is a web service that accelerates the distribution of static and dynamic web content to your users, such as .html,.css,.js, and image files. CloudFront distributes your content via a global network of data centers known as edge locations.

When a user requests content that you're serving with CloudFront, the request is routed to the edge location with the lowest latency (time delay), ensuring that the content is delivered as quickly as possible.

CloudFront delivers content immediately if it is already in the edge location with the lowest latency.

If the content isn't in that edge location, CloudFront retrieves it from a predefined origin, such as an Amazon S3 bucket, a MediaPackage channel, or an HTTP server (such as a web server) that you've designated as the source for the definitive version of your content

CloudFront accelerates content distribution by routing each user request through the AWS backbone network to the nearest edge location that can best serve your content. This is typically a CloudFront edge server that provides the quickest delivery to the viewer.

Using the AWS network reduces the number of networks that your users' requests must traverse, improving performance. Users benefit from reduced latency (the time it takes to load the first byte of a file) and faster data transfer rates.

You also benefit from increased reliability and availability because copies of your files (also known as objects) are now stored (or cached) in multiple edge locations around the world.

How Does Amazon CloudFront Work?

CloudFront integrates with any AWS origin, including Amazon S3, Amazon EC2, Elastic Load Balancing, and any custom HTTP origin. CloudFront's secure and programmable edge computing features CloudFront Functions and AWS Lambda@Edge allows you to customize your content delivery.

Key Benefits of CloudFront

  • Global Scaled Network for Fast Content Delivery

    Amazon CloudFront is massively scalable and distributed globally. The CloudFront network has over 225 points of presence (PoPs) that are interconnected via the AWS backbone to provide your end users with ultra-low latency performance and high availability

    The Amazon Web Services backbone is a private network built on a global, fully redundant, parallel 100 GbE metro fiber network connected by trans-oceanic cables across the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans, as well as the Mediterranean, Red Sea, and South China Seas.

    Amazon CloudFront intelligently routes your users' traffic to the most performant AWS edge location to serve cached or dynamic content based on network conditions. CloudFront includes a multi-tiered caching architecture by default, which provides improved cache width and origin protection.

  • Deep Integration with AWS

    Amazon CloudFront is easily configured with AWS services like Amazon S3, Amazon EC2, Elastic Load Balancing, Amazon Route 53, and AWS Elemental Media Services.

    You can use the AWS management console or familiar developer tools like CloudFormation templates, the AWS Cloud Development Kit, and APIs as a developer. The integration of CloudFront with Amazon Cloudwatch and Kinesis provides real-time observability via metrics and logs.

  • Security at the Edge

    Amazon CloudFront is a highly secure CDN that protects both the network and the application. AWS Shield Standard protects all of your CloudFront distributions by default against the most common network and transport layer DDoS attacks that target your websites or applications.

    To defend against more complex attacks, integrate CloudFront with AWS Shield Advanced and AWS Web Application Firewall to create a flexible, layered security perimeter (WAF). AWS Managed Rules for AWS WAF provide you with firewall rules curated and managed by Amazon security experts to protect against common CVEs and OWASP Top 10 security risks.

  • Highly Programmable and Secure Edge Computing

    You can easily run code across AWS locations globally with edge compute features CloudFront Functions and Lambda@Edge, allowing you to personalize content and respond to your end users with reduced latency.

    For example, you can use CloudFront Functions to deliver personalized content based on visitor attributes, generate custom responses, or run A/B testing on AWS infrastructure using your own custom code. You can supplement or completely replace your origin servers with Lambda@Edge. Lambda@Edge can be used to render web pages on the server, manipulate streaming manifest files on the fly for ad insertion, or add security tokens. With built-in security isolation, CloudFront Functions and Lambda@Edge both protect your data from attack.

  • Cost-Effective

    Amazon CloudFront provides global content delivery at a low cost. There are no transfer fees for origin fetches from any AWS origin, and AWS Certificate Manager (ACM) provides free custom TLS certificates.

    CloudFront offers a variety of pricing options, including simple pay-as-you-go pricing with no upfront fees and the CloudFront Security Savings Bundle, which can save you up to 30% more. Custom pricing is available for minimum traffic commitments (typically 10 TB/month or higher) for steeper discounts. Your existing AWS Support subscription includes CDN support.