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CDN — Does It Actually Help?

Caching layer comparison across 23,030 WooCommerce stores

Only 40.3% of WooCommerce stores use a CDN — the rest rely on origin servers alone

Sites with CDN

9,287

40.3% of total

Sites without CDN

12,568

54.6% of total

Cached TTFB (CDN)

378ms

weighted median

Cached TTFB (No CDN)

484ms

weighted median

Caching Layer Adoption

Distribution across 23,030 WooCommerce stores

CDN vs Server-Side Cache vs No Cache

Origin TTFB should be similar across groups (CDN doesn't speed up the server). Cached TTFB is where CDN shines.

Category	Count	Cached Median	Origin Median	Improvement
CDN (Edge)	9,213	378ms	995ms	62.0%
Server-Side Cache	1,156	273ms	1,113ms	75.5%
No Cache	12,368	484ms	1,028ms	52.9%

Cached Homepage TTFB by Provider

Sorted fastest to slowest. Only providers with 5+ sites shown.

Detailed Provider Statistics

Provider	Type	Count	Cached Median	Origin Median	Improvement	% Under 200ms	% Under 500ms
Nginx FastCGI	Server Cache	88	193ms	805ms	76.0%	51.1%	76.1%
Fastly	CDN	631	260ms	1,287ms	79.8%	44.8%	55.8%
LiteSpeed	Server Cache	984	274ms	1,151ms	76.2%	33.7%	73.7%
Varnish	Server Cache	78	307ms	998ms	69.2%	33.3%	59.0%
Cloudflare	CDN	8,582	387ms	974ms	60.3%	29.6%	64.0%
No CDN/Cache	—	12,368	484ms	1,028ms	52.9%	23.5%	50.6%
Caddy	Server Cache	6	786ms	906ms	13.2%	33.3%	33.3%

CDN helps browsers, not shoppers

CDN helps anonymous visitors browsing your catalog. But the moment they add to cart, session cookies bypass CDN edge cache and every request hits your origin server.

Page Type	CDN Helps?	Why
Homepage (anonymous)	Yes	Served from edge cache
Product pages (anonymous)	Yes	Served from edge cache
Cart	No	Session cookies bypass cache
Checkout	No	Session cookies bypass cache
My Account	No	Logged-in user, dynamic content

This is why origin TTFB matters — see Report 1: The Reality Check.

Cached TTFB Pass Rates by Category

Percentage of sites with cached homepage TTFB under threshold

Group	Count	% Under 200ms	% Under 500ms
CDN (Edge)	9,213	37.2%	59.9%
Server-Side Cache	1,156	37.9%	60.5%
No Cache	12,368	23.5%	50.6%

Methodology

Cache provider detection is based on response headers: cf-cache-status (Cloudflare), x-fastly-request-id (Fastly), x-varnish (Varnish), x-litespeed-cache (LiteSpeed), x-fastcgi-cache (Nginx FastCGI), and x-caddy-cache (Caddy).

CDN vs Server-Side Cache: CDN providers (Cloudflare, Fastly) operate edge proxy networks that cache content at PoPs worldwide. Server-side caches (Varnish, LiteSpeed, Nginx FastCGI, Caddy) run on or near the origin server — they speed up response generation but don't reduce network latency.

Cached homepage TTFB is measured without cookies — an anonymous visitor hitting the homepage. This is the best-case scenario where CDN edge caching can serve from a nearby PoP.

Origin TTFB is measured with WooCommerce session cookies set, forcing the server to bypass page cache and generate a dynamic response. CDN cannot help here.

"No CDN/Cache" means cache_provider is None — no caching headers were detected in the response. The site may still have server-side optimizations that don't advertise via headers.

Sample threshold: Providers with fewer than 5 sites are shown in the detailed table but excluded from charts to avoid misleading conclusions from small samples.