Amazon CloudFront

Amazon CloudFront is a content delivery network (CDN) offered by Amazon Web Services. Content delivery networks provide a globally-distributed network of proxy servers which cache content, such as web videos or other bulky media, more locally to consumers, thus improving access speed for downloading the content.

Amazon CloudFront
Amazon CloudFront streaming logo
Type of site
Content Delivery Network (CDN)
OwnerAmazon
URLaws.amazon.com/cloudfront/
RegistrationRequired
LaunchedNovember 18, 2008 (2008-11-18)

CloudFront has servers located in Europe (United Kingdom, Ireland, The Netherlands, Germany, Spain), Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Taiwan and India), Australia, South America, as well as in several major cities in the United States. The service operates from (as of December 2017) 107 edge locations on five continents.[1]

CloudFront operates on a pay-as-you-go basis.

CloudFront competes with larger content delivery networks such as Akamai and Limelight Networks. Upon launch, Larry Dignan of ZDNet News stated that CloudFront could cause price and margin reductions for competing CDNs.[2]

Timeline
  • November 18, 2008 – Beta launch of CloudFront
  • January 28, 2009 – Amazon reduces pricing tiers
  • May 7, 2009 – Adds access logging capability
  • November 11, 2009 – Adds support for private content
  • December 15, 2009 – Announced Amazon CloudFront Streaming
  • March 28, 2010 – Amazon launches edge locations in Singapore and adds private content for streaming
  • May, 2014, Amazon CloudFront is included in the Free Tier usage[3]

Amazon CloudFront edge locations

As of October 2018, Amazon CloudFront consists of 138 access points (127 edge locations and 11 regional edge caches) in 63 cities across 29 countries.[4]

  • North America
    • Edge locations: Ashburn, VA (3); Atlanta, GA (3); Boston, MA; Chicago, IL (2); Dallas/Fort Worth, TX (5); Denver, CO (2); Hayward, CA; Jacksonville, FL; Los Angeles, CA (4); Miami, FL (3); Minneapolis, MN; Montreal, QC; New York, NY (3); Newark, NJ (3); Palo Alto, CA; Philadelphia, PA; Phoenix, AZ; San Jose, CA (2); Seattle, WA (3); South Bend, IN; St. Louis, MO; Toronto, ON
    • Regional Edge caches: Virginia; Ohio; Oregon
  • Europe
    • Edge locations: Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2); Berlin, Germany; Copenhagen, Denmark; Dublin, Ireland; Frankfurt, Germany (8); Helsinki, Finland; London, England (7); Madrid, Spain (2); Manchester, England; Marseille, France; Milan, Italy; Munich, Germany; Oslo, Norway; Palermo, Italy; Paris, France (4); Prague, Czech Republic; Stockholm, Sweden (3); Vienna, Austria; Warsaw, Poland; Zurich, Switzerland
    • Regional Edge caches: Frankfurt, Germany; London, England
  • Asia
    • Edge locations: Bangalore, India; Chennai, India (2); Hong Kong, China (3); Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Mumbai, India (2); Manila, Philippines; New Delhi, India (2); Osaka, Japan; Seoul, South Korea (4); Singapore (3); Taipei, Taiwan(3); Tokyo, Japan (9)
    • Regional Edge caches: Mumbai, India; Singapore; Seoul, South Korea; Tokyo, Japan
  • Australia
    • Edge locations: Melbourne; Perth; Sydney
    • Regional Edge caches: Sydney
  • South America
    • Edge locations: São Paulo, Brazil (2); Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2)
    • Regional Edge caches: São Paulo, Brazil
  • Middle East
    • Edge location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Fujairah, United Arab Emirates
  • Africa
    • Edge locations: Johannesburg, South Africa; Cape Town, South Africa

Use cases
  • Website acceleration
  • Video streaming
  • Content download
  • Static or dynamic content

Logs

CloudFront allows users to enable or disable logging. If enabled, the logs are stored on Amazon S3 buckets which can then be analyzed. These logs contain useful information like,

  • Date / time
  • Edge location
  • Protocol used etc.

These logs can be analyzed by using third-party tools such as S3Stat, Cloudlytics, Qloudstat, or AWS Stats.

References
  1. "Amazon CloudFront Product Details". Amazon.com. Archived from the original on 2017-12-23. Retrieved January 4, 2018. To deliver content to end users with lower latency, Amazon CloudFront uses a global network of 107 Points of Presence (96 Edge Locations and 11 Regional Edge Caches) in 55 cities across 24 countries.
  2. Larry Dignan (November 18, 2008). "Amazon launches CloudFront; Content delivery network margins go kaboom". Between the Lines. ZDNet. Archived from the original on 2014-10-22. Retrieved January 4, 2018.
  3. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-06-17. Retrieved 2018-12-10.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. "Key Features of a Content Delivery Network| Performance, Security | Amazon CloudFront". web.archive.org. October 18, 2018.
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