What is a CDN (Content Delivery Network)?

A CDN is basically a network of multiple servers that are located at various different places in the world. It caches all the static content of your site like the images and CSS-JavaScript files and stores on its servers.
So when a person visits your site, the static content will be delivered to them through the server that is closest to them. 

As you can see, when that data is delivered from a distance, it will surely take more time to load. But, when the same thing is done through a server that is close to them, the site will be loaded very fast.
So now that you know why you should start using CDN, you will start looking for the best ones out there. You have no need to look any further as below is a complete list of some of the best CDN services for WordPress blog that are absolutely free to use.

1. CloudFlare

CloudFlare is, hands down, the best CDN service for WordPress that is absolutely free. The data centers are located all across the world to serve you the content at blazing fast speed.
The implementation is extremely easy – you create a free account then you add your blog URL and once CloudFlare checks your websites, it will provide you with custom nameservers and you just have to point your domains to that nameservers and you are done!

The reason CloudFlare is extremely popular is that it makes your site load extremely fast and on average the site see 65% fewer requests and saves around 60% bandwidth.

2. Photon by Jetpack

If you are running a WordPress blog, then I am very sure that you are using the Jetpack plugin as well. The plugin is a must have for WordPress blogs because it offers a number of options to make your blog user-friendly. One of them is Photon CDN!
This Photon feature is not like the other CDN services for WordPress, but if your blog contains lots and lots of images, then it would be a great help to activate this feature.
Photon is a content delivery network that loads images on your blog through the powerful WordPress.com servers.
To activate Photon, you just need to install Jetpack plugin on your blog and then activate the Photon feature from your site dashboard.

3. SwarmCDN

This service is relatively new compared to the others in the list, but since it offers a free plan with 250 GB of free transfer, I had to mention it in this post.

If you are truly looking for a CDN service, you need to try out SwarmCDN as it offers a free transfer and is also available in around 196 countries worldwide.

4. jsDelivr

jsDelivr is a CDN service for hosting JavaScript files. If you run a WordPress blog, then there will be a lot of JavaScript files in your blog and most of them will be run through this network.
The most important use of jsDelivr is when you use some custom JavaScript code on your site and you have to host it. If that’s the case, you need to use the service and also install the free WordPress plugin on your blog.

5. Coral CDN

Coral CDN is a P2P (peer-to-peer) based content delivery network and a project from MIT. The service is free of cost because since it relies on the P2P network, billions of computers are connected across the world, making it absolutely free.
The way Coral CDN works, according to their WordPress plugin is by serving the static content through their servers by appending ‘nyud.net’ to the URL.’

Other Paid Options:

There are these 5 CDN services that are absolutely free to use to speed up your WordPress blog, there are other much better options out there if you are willing to spend money.
Here are the brief introductions for all the paid CDN networks:
  1. MaxCDN – The best one there is! All the major sites use MaxCDN to deliver their content and keep themselves blazingly fast. The pricing starts at $9/month.
  2. Incapsula – This CDN service not only makes your site load fast, but also provides website security and DDoS protection as well. The content is delivered through their globally powered network. The pricing for Incapsula starts at $19/month.
  3. RackSpace – This CDN service is a pay-as-you-go service. The pricing starts at $0.00014 for the first TB of storage and $0.12 for the first 10 TB of CDN bandwidth. Check out their pricing structure for a better idea.
  4. Amazon AWS – The Amazon AWS offers a free trial that includes 5 GB of Amazon S3 storage and 20000 get requests and 2000 put requests. You can visit the pricing structure of Amazon CDN services to know more about it.

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