What is Edge Caching and why you should implement it?

To be successful nowadays, you really need a fast and reliable website. You risk losing visitors and customers if your website experiences frequent downtime or if load times are too long. Online visitors expect web pages to load instantly. If this doesn't happen, they will quickly move on to a competitor’s site. To prevent this, it's important to make your website faster and more reliable. Edge Caching can significantly increase your website’s speed, but what exactly is Edge Caching, and why do you need it? Let us explain.

What is Edge Caching?

Edge Caching is a technique where the most requested content from your website is stored on servers located near the end user, known as 'edge servers'. Instead of every visitor fetching data from the main server, this data is locally cached and delivered by a nearby edge server. This reduces the amount of data that needs to be transferred over long distances, which significantly shortens load times. Edge Caching is often used in combination with Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) like Cloudflare.

How exactly does Edge Caching work?

With Edge Caching, specific rules are set to determine which content should be stored locally. This can include static files such as images, JavaScript and CSS, but also dynamic HTML pages and the output of slower scripts, like PHP. When a visitor accesses the website, the system first checks if the requested content is already available in the cache. If it is, the cached version is delivered to the user. If not, the data is fetched from the main server and then stored for future requests. This prevents the same content from being generated repeatedly.

The benefits of Edge Caching

Implementing Edge Caching offers several advantages, not just for you as the website owner but also for your visitors. We’re happy to tell you more about some of the key benefits.

Faster load times

By storing content closer to the end user, pages load significantly faster. In some cases, the capacity of a web server can be increased by a factor of 100. Websites handling hundreds of thousands of visitors per hour can manage this on a small and inexpensive VPS, as 98% of the requests are handled via Edge Caching.

Less strain on the server

High server load can lead to several issues that negatively impact a website's performance. When too many requests are handled by a single server, it can slow down response times, causing pages to load slowly or even timeout. This poor performance frustrates users, increases bounce rates, and can lead to a loss of potential customers. Additionally, a heavily burdened server is more prone to crashes or downtime, which further damages user experience. The load on the server is significantly reduced when Edge Caching is implemented. Since fewer requests are sent directly to the main server, the server experiences much less strain. This allows you to provide higher capacity with fewer resources, which is especially beneficial for high-traffic websites.

Protection against DDoS attacks

Edge Caching also helps reduce the impact of Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. Since most requests are handled by edge servers, the main server is less likely to be overwhelmed, better protecting your website from attacks.

Improved user experience

With faster load times and a more reliable website, the overall user experience improves. Visitors are less likely to leave due to slow loading, which leads to higher conversions and improved customer satisfaction.

The challenges of Edge Caching

While Edge Caching offers interesting benefits, it’s important to know there are some downsides to consider as well. Of course, we’ll go over these disadvantages with you below.

Session management

For websites where users have sessions, such as e-commerce stores, it’s important to ensure that user sessions don’t get mixed up. In some cases, this means that the website’s template must be modified. For example, you want to avoid situations where one customer can see another customer's shopping cart due to incorrect caching. While this can be a complex process, it’s a very important process for the safe and correct functioning of your website.

Cache invalidation

Updates to your website are not always immediately visible when Edge Caching is implemented. If you update a product page, for instance, the old version may still be served from the cache. It's important to ensure that changes are immediately communicated to the cache system so that the most recent version is always displayed. This requires careful cache management.

When is Edge Caching not the best choice for your website?

Edge Caching is generally a smart technology that offers many advantages, but it isn’t suitable for every website. For dynamic websites where users frequently enter personal information or complete transactions, extra caution must be taken with caching. There is a risk that incorrectly cached pages could result in the exposure of private data or that transactions might not be processed correctly. This is why some template modifications may be necessary to ensure that caching is implemented safely.

Edge Caching is also less suitable for websites that are frequently updated, such as news sites or blogs with regular updates. In these cases, the complexity of cache invalidation could mean that you spend more time managing the cache than improving the website itself.

Free scan: is your website suitable for Edge Caching?

If you're unsure whether Edge Caching is suitable for your website, we offer a free scan to determine if your site meets the requirements. During this scan, we assess your website’s structure, the amount of dynamic content, and how frequently your content is updated. Based on this, we provide tailored advice. If your website is suitable for Edge Caching and you're ready to proceed, we can assist you with the implementation.

How is Edge Caching implemented?

Implementing Edge Caching is not always straightforward and often requires customization. One of the biggest challenges is modifying your website to support caching without causing issues with session management or content updates. We have successfully implemented Edge Caching for large Magento web shops many times, so we know exactly what to look for. We ensure that your website remains fast, secure, and scalable without sacrificing functionality.

We also help set up the right cache invalidation rules to ensure that your website is always up to date. This means that you can easily communicate changes to products or other content to the cache system without worrying about users seeing outdated versions.

We can help you implement Edge Caching

You should always be able to rely on a fast and reliable website. Edge Caching provides the perfect solution for websites that need to deliver high performance and handle large volumes of traffic. By storing content closer to the user, load times are significantly reduced, your website is better protected against attacks, and your server is much less strained. The potential downsides of Edge Caching can be easily solved with the right expertise. We are here to help.

Are you curious whether Edge Caching is suitable for your website? Request a free scan from us. We’ll provide you with honest advice and ensure that your website performs optimally. Want to learn more about Edge Caching first? Feel free to contact us. We’re here to assist you in any way we can.