Description
You would like to use Cloudflare on your domain
Compatbility, Benefits, and Downsides
- The mod_cloudflare web server module is installed on our servers so that when clients wish to use it (and are willing to manage any issues that could be a result of Cloudflare), our firewall will not start blocking CloudFlare IPs. The module ensures our servers and firewalls see the right visitor IPs when cloudflare is active.
- Using other DNS-takeover style CDNs - where you have to change your name servers to use them - might result in firewall blocks as they do not publish IP mapping modules
- CloudFlare Cache: the "Cache Everything" option with "Edge Cache TTL" might result in significant CAPTCHA user verification. If that occurs for you, disable that aggressive level of caching in CloudFlare and instead either enable nginx caching in Plesk or if you're using WordPress, check out our guide to setting up caching with WordPress, which will be far better for performance and compatibility than Cloudflare's cache.
- CloudFlare Security: many have reported odd issues in WordPress (like with saving posts) while using any level of Cloudflare Security that isn't "Essentially Off" - our built in security solutions are far more targetted and easier to adjust when needed. We recommend using the Essentially Off security setting at Cloudflare unless you know your site is or will be under attack - in such a scenario doubling up on firewalls can't hurt.
Benefits to using CloudFlare:
- Geographic Distribution: With Cloudflare, loading your site should be faster when being accessed from other continents (This is the #1 reason to use a CDN like Cloudflare)
- Possible Enhanced Security: It can provide some level of security protection
- Synthetic Performance Benchmarks: Speed analysis tools like GT Metrix will give you a higher score simply for using a content delivery network (CDN), without actually measuring the real-world performance differences.
Downsides to using CloudFlare:
- Local Traffic Might be Slower: If your website visitors are mostly local and the CDN's nearest server is farther or has worse connectivity than our servers in Montreal, then it'll actually slow down your site.
- Difficulty with Troubleshooting: Because you're adding yet another layer to the way your website loads, troubleshooting issues becomes very difficult. If your site goes down, it's rare that we can help as issues like this are more commonly a problem with the CDN
- More Manual DNS Work: Because these types of CDNs like CloudFlare take over your DNS, when you add sub-domains or make changes to your DNS records in Plesk you will find they do not become live until you've also changed them in the CDN's panel. Similarly, changing name servers to your CDN's may reset your MX records, resulting in incoming mail no longer functioning after enabling the CDN unless you explicitly create those records manually.
- Conflicts: There are often conflicts between CloudFlare's aggressive caching and security solutions when used in combination with our own caching and security solutions. We have frequently found our own solutions to outperform those of Cloudflare.
Because of these downsides, having CloudFlare enabled has on many occasions delayed resolution of issues and made narrowing down problems extremely time consuming and/or costly for our customers.
You've probably seen other hosts recommending Cloudflare. We don't need to do this because we include solutions with our hosting for most of what Cloudflare can do for your website:
- Faster Website Speed: If your target audience is in North America or Europe, Cloudflare isn't likely to provide much of a speed benefit. If you're using WordPress, try using our optimization guide here instead: our server optimizations are compatible with common caching plugins like WP Super Cache and WP Rocket.
- You have customers globally: Try a CDN that doesn't take over your DNS instead, like MaxCDN, BunnyCDN, or RocketCDN. Please consult the documentation for your caching system (ex: WP Super Cache or WP Rocket for WordPress) to learn how best to integrate.
- Enhanced Security: We use the Imunify360 security layer on our shared servers (and it's available to purchase for our VPS offerings as well). This provides equivalent or better functionality compared to Cloudflare's firewall.
