Cloudflare actually slows your website down

So I've almost always used Cloudflare for my personal websites. Recently I started asking my self why? Is it better than just a DNS?

I don't need the security, DDOS protection, caching, auto minify or Rocket Loader. And I don't care that you can see my servers IP address.

Time to speed test

Pingdom Tools and Gtmetrix are probably the best free speed test services out there.

Not sure why Pingdom's screenshot is not working. Nevertheless – I was chocked by the speed difference.

With Cloudflare

Without Cloudflare

31.7% faster

47.6% faster!

Conclusion

You probably don't need Cloudflare. Just use a solid DNS provider along with a CDN, and you'll be golden.

This site is served with static HTML files. With a more complex and dynamic website you might get different results. Better or worse? Do you know? Send me an email!