Significant improvements using CloudFlare?

clarkwinkelmann

Pollux have you noticed significant improvements in using Cloudflare with Flarum ? Could you tell us more about your findings if so (maybe in another discussion) ? Was that bandwidth mostly images ? Or does it also include Flarum API requests, which I guess can't be easily cached ?

Pollux

clarkwinkelmann have you noticed significant improvements in using Cloudflare with Flarum ?

I didn't use Cloudflare Then and don't use it now, so I cannot answer your question.

I'm using a SSL connection to offer a maximum of privacy to my users, so I don't want to give this up lightly. Especially if I'm dealing with a US based company (which I don't trust the least due to US governmental requirements). That's not because the contents discussed in my forum are so sensitive, it's a matter of principle for me.

Furthermore, the advantages of Cloudflare aren't very important for me. My website is in German and therefore not accessed from all over the world (it's hosted in Germany now btw.). It's not making money, so the risk of DDoS attacks is less of an issue for me as well. And as I said, bandwidth is not very expensive nowadays.

Sanguine

clarkwinkelmann I've used CF for various projects. For static content + max cache settings it was very good. But with mostly dynamic content it just adds latency. Also, it's one extra cache layer to debug, which may complicate stuff.

nitaaikumar

Sanguine @clarkwinkelmann I fully agree. Switching on the Cloudflare cache makes the dynamic pages of Flarum load like a car instead of the normal rocket speed when the CloudFlare cache is off. So CloudFlare cache should be turned off to realize Flarum's full speed.

010101

This is an older thread so it may not matter anymore but I recently stopped using Cloudflare. The free plan caused issues with my SSL certificates renewing. Long story.

And, I don’t miss it. My sites aren’t any slower. At least in my location.

[deleted]

Actually, I'm going to play devils advocate here. I went with cloudflare because I have issues with let's encrypt not renewing - admittedly, that's because of the .well-known issues and cloudflare DNS. However, the stored improvements are significant when using cloudflare. It's a difference between 1.5s and 335ms without and with cloudflare.

User39

I've had a good experience with them. Also their speed page shows my site loading faster with their service.

(Though it is their service reporting on their service.)

tankerkiller125

User39 I've actually seen a pretty good improvement, the best way to see the improvement honestly is get on a boat and travel several miles from shore (until cell service is poor) and then load your site with and without Cloudflare. Or you know you could just into a basement with poor cell service ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[deleted]

tankerkiller125 or, if you work for a multinational company with diverse graphical locations like I do, it's possible to test from all four corners of the earth 👍

AndrewBond

I used Cloudflare on two sites. Its proved invaluable when I initially moved the DNS over to cloudflare. If I change hosts the DNS changes are instant.

I have noticed not disconcernable speed differences.

KimYunz

One thing there is some errors you can found while using rocket loader of cloudflare