Cloudflare Reviews

1. CDN
2. Security

One of my projects, ancient-origins.net, gets 3 million views per month, so serving the page fast is an important element. Using the CDN of Cloudflare improved the speed significantly, reducing the page loading times to appropriate levels. Additionally their security features make sure to block attacks on our site.

Their CDN features, although good, still lack in speed in comparison to their competitors (e.g. Incapsula, MaxCDN, etc.).

I've been using it for almost one year.

No issues with the deployment. Their process is pretty simple and fast.

Yes, there were a few times when some of their CDN nodes would fail, creating serious speed issues with the site without any warning or notification from their side. Also, many times, even if our server is working properly, Cloudflare would report it as being down.

No scalability issues so far.

I would give them a 9/10. They respond pretty fast to requests.

I would give an 8/10 to their technical support. We haven’t had many issues, but when we do, it appears that sometimes they are not willing to look deeper into them to try and find a solution.

We used MaxCDN, but we switched to Cloudflare because MaxCDN lacks security features.

The initial setup is pretty straightforward and doesn’t require any technical knowledge, since everything is done on their site.

The implementation was done in-house, since it is a simple process.

This is difficult to calculate; however, improving the page loading speed always impacts the traffic on a site positively.

The original setup cost was zero, and the monthly cost is around $30 for three sites using the Business Cloudflare plan.

We evaluated MaxCDN and Incapsula.

If your budget is low, then Cloudflare is the only cost effective solution, at least to begin with. The best combination of CDN and security features at a low price. At a slightly higher budget, Incapsula may be a better solution especially since they provide a faster CDN and better security features.

We use the solution for all our products hosted on Azure.

The solution is stable, and the DNS servers are simple to use.

Cloudflare should add more documentation and pricing to the cloud version.

I have been using Cloudflare DNS for nine years, since 2014.

I rate the solution’s stability a ten out of ten.

We never faced any problems with scalability. We’ve 100-200 users using the solution.

The initial setup is straightforward and takes 15-20 minutes to complete if you want to start a new one. 

Deployment is pretty straightforward when you take a domain. You need to set the DNS to Cloudflare. Once that is done, it hardly takes one or two minutes to take effect. We first pointed to Cloudflare as our DNS. From there, it took a pretty simple configuration for our web browser.

We deployed the solution by ourselves.

We are using the free tier of the solution.

When we started, Cloudflare was the best solution for us. We were using the free service, and it was working well. We never considered switching to Azure DNS because Cloudflare met our needs. Azure DNS has improved recently, and they now offer free SSL domain registration on App Services.

Overall, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

Cloudflare is mostly a CDN service plus DDoS protection, but they are now offering services like cloud object storage, which AWS under S3. Cloudflare provides a cheaper alternative. They also have zero trust and load-balancing services. 

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.

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. 

I've used Cloudflare DNS for one year.

Last year, the service went down, but it was only 49 minutes.  

Setting up Cloudflare DNS is easy. They have a simple web interface and also an API for advanced users. 

We use the free version of CloudFlare

I rate CloudFlare DNS nine out of 10. I would recommend it. It's the fastest DNS service. 

I just switched to Cloudflare as my domain registrar. That led me to use their CDN service, and I will probably use them for SSL when that is available. 

Cloudflare has made management of my website much easier by combining various functions in one platform without compromising quality. There are also less dark UX patterns than other vendors, so I have peace of mind knowing they aren't trying to trick me or make complicated procedures to attempt to lock me into their service. That is very refreshing!

The dashboard is very well thought out, giving useful information and providing easy access to useful functionality I wasn't aware of.

This is a very minor thing since I can't think of many ways for them to improve: It looks like they don't support as many TLDs as other registrars, but since they are very new as a registrar, I expect this may improve soon. For example, there are many TLDs in this list, but /co is missing: https://www.cloudflare.com/tld...

This solution has been stable so far, and monitoring of Cloudflare has shown them to be reliable.

So far, scalability has done well, but I am not a heavy user.

I haven't contacted support which indicates a good self-serve product. The tools to answer your own questions are there, so support is built-in without ever needing to reach a person. 

I switched to Cloudflare from GoDaddy because Cloudflare promoted "at cost" domains. 

The initial setup was very straightforward.

Self-managed.

Less cost for domains and more satisfaction which is hard to put a dollar value to.

Cost for all services I have researched in Cloudflare is straightforward, and they don't include hidden fees. I'm not a heavy CDN user since I don't get much traffic, so I can't speak too much about the value for their CDN.

I've used various solutions like full hosting companies (Bluehost, iPage, etc.) and most recently GoDaddy. I also looked at Google domains and Namecheap. 

I encourage anyone interested in holistic internet service delivery solutions to check out Cloudflare. They have nice simple solutions that work well together, are easy to set up, and their UI/UX is intuitive.

Cloudflare is typically a firewall. There are several editions available, such as the free edition.

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

The pricing could be improved.

I have been using Cloudflare for one year.

The product is stable.

I rate the solution’s stability an eight out of ten.

The solution’s scalability is good.

I rate the solution’s scalability an eight out of ten.

We never need to contact customer service.

The initial setup is straightforward and takes a few hours. One person can do that.

​I did the deployment myself as a solution architect.

You might be on the free edition, depending on your chosen edition. With the free edition, you receive the top ten protection services.

If Microsoft offered something similar to Cloudflare at the same price, it would be much better because you're already on Azure utilizing resources for CI/CD and transitioning to Cloudflare. From the most basic functionalities to the highest level, they are all awesome if you prevent unauthorized access to your website data through penetration testing.

Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

We are an IT consulting company, we provide solutions to our customers. We implement the solutions for our customers. Some of our customers use CloudFlare, some of them are using  Imperva and Palo Alto.

Our customers use this solution for any web traffic, mostly GCP or to AWS cloud as a backend.

I like caching and DDoS. There are key things that are used for our enterprise customers, such as Lambda and DNS.

Latencies are always a problem.

Also, one thing I would say is you have to maintain DNS through their services. I don't know if that's a requirement or not.

Latencies are the key issue. If you are not caching and just using DDoS then definitely, there are some latencies added to the traffic.

I have been working with Cloudflare for more than six years.

We work with many different versions. For new customers, we use the latest version.

I haven't had any issues with stability. We haven't heard anything from our clients.

It's a stable solution.

It is easy to scale. We haven't had any problems with scalability.

We have not used technical support.

Cloudflare is very straightforward. It is easy to set up.

There is no installation, you just go through the configuration process.

The price is reasonable.

It all depends on what the customer is looking for. These are two different areas. Basically, CloudFare is completely Cloud-based, whereas Imperva I can have a physical appliance or a virtual appliance, or a cloud-based. 

My solution is based on what customers are looking for, but Cloudflare is pretty good and getting really popular in terms of DDoS, the paid version of it.

We looked at the service. What are acceptable latencies? Is it okay to route through a different vendor, and before it reaches the backup? They have to go through multiple vendors. You also have to consider what the latencies cost and is that acceptable for the service. These are key things you need to consider when selecting a cloud-based vendor for DDoS.

I would rate Cloudflare a nine out of ten.

I use Cloudflare to secure my own websites and servers since I use the proxy functionality to hide my website/server IP. Also, I like to use Cloudflare DNS manager. I think it's simple and easy to use.

I did use Cloudflare as a freelancer or for my personal projects. So I made some websites, and I recommended my freelance customers to use Cloudflare for their DNS management. Also, I did use it in one organization. It was a startup, and it was me and my friend working there, so I did recommend the startup owner to use Cloudflare because of caching functionalities that could speed up your websites and so on.

The most valuable feature of the solution is the proxy, so I can hide my servers. So no one can scan them, especially for port scanning, since we were hacked once. I did buy a VPS server, and I was just getting started. So I started MongoDB and left the port open. Someone scanned the website and saw the open port, and since I was just starting, I didn't set a password. He managed to get in, and he locked the database and locked all the data (ransomware). When using Cloudflare, I was sure that no one knew my real server IP address.

I couldn't think of buying it since I am from Tunisia. We have really strict limitations to buying internationally. So our bank cards are available only in Tunisia. When you own a company, the bank allows you to buy things from outside of Tunisia. Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't be able to buy Cloudflare in my country. The aforementioned details can be considered for improvement.

I have been using Cloudflare for two or three years. Also, I am using the free plan version.

I rate its stability a ten out of ten.

I rate its scalability a ten out of ten because I had no issues with it. Also, it was fast when updating my DNS records. So, that's why I always recommend it to my friends and organizations I deal with.

I have plans to increase the usage of the solution.

I have never contacted Cloudflare's support team.

Positive

The initial setup was really simple and user friendly.

I did not evaluate other options. I found Cloudflare on a YouTube tutorial. So I tried it and liked it, and I never even thought about looking for something else.

I was using the free plan, and mainly, I was using it for DNS management as it was simple. When I buy a new domain, I don't use the main DNS management system. Also, I use it for IP protection. I didn't have the time to really use much of the solution. As far as I know, it's all good. I did see a new feature, but I didn't really manage to get it. I didn't use it.

I would definitely recommend it to those planning to use it.

I rate the overall solution a ten out of ten.

We use it for DNS load balancing and WAF. 

The solution offers the flexibility to control configuration rules. 

The product needs to improve its automation. 

I have been using the product for two and a half years. 

I would rate the product's stability a ten out of ten since it never went down for me. 

I would rate the solution's scalability a ten out of ten since I didn't encounter any issues with it. 

The tool's setup straightforward. 

We have had ROI with the tool's use since it never gave us downtime and made us lose millions. 

I will rate the product an eight out of ten. Cloudflare is better than Cloud DNS. You need to start using Terraform along with Cloudflare. It will make your life easier without the need for manual creation. People usually thing they are going to use Cloudflare less but will end up using it more.