Cloudflare is a security & identity tool for Developers and Enterprise, offered as freemium ($5/mo). Founded in United States in 2009.
About Cloudflare
Cloudflare is a San Francisco-based, publicly listed company founded in 2009 that runs one of the largest global networks on the internet. Websites and applications put Cloudflare in front of their origin servers to get CDN caching, authoritative DNS, SSL, DDoS protection, a web application firewall, bot management and rate limiting. On top of that network it has built a developer platform and a zero-trust security suite.
The developer platform includes Workers for serverless code at the edge, Pages for static and full-stack sites, R2 object storage that is S3-compatible with no egress fees, D1 (serverless SQLite), KV, Queues, Durable Objects, Workers AI for running models on its GPUs, and Vectorize for embeddings. The zero-trust side covers Access, Tunnel and Gateway, replacing VPNs for internal apps, plus email security. The free plan is unusually generous, covering CDN, DNS, SSL, DDoS protection, Workers and Pages; Pro and Business are per-domain upgrades with stronger WAF rules and SLAs, Workers Paid starts at $5 per month, and Enterprise is negotiated.
Nearly any website benefits from Cloudflare's free tier for DNS and caching, and developers pick Workers and R2 to avoid cold starts and egress bills. The breadth of products can feel fragmented, some services are less mature than their AWS or Google Cloud equivalents, and support on lower plans is limited. Compared with Vercel or Netlify it offers lower costs plus its own storage and databases, while Akamai and Fastly compete on enterprise CDN and security.
Key features of Cloudflare
- CDN, DNS, SSL and DDoS protection on every plan
- WAF, bot management and rate limiting
- Workers edge functions, Pages hosting and Workers AI
- R2 object storage with no egress fees
- D1, KV, Queues, Durable Objects and Vectorize
- Zero Trust access, tunnels and email security
Pros and cons
Pros
- Industry-leading free tier
- Zero egress R2 undercuts S3 dramatically
- Global performance and security
- Rapid product expansion
Cons
- Product sprawl can confuse
- Some services less mature than AWS/GCP
- Support on lower plans is limited
- Enterprise pricing is opaque
Cloudflare pricing
Cloudflare uses a freemium model.
| Plan | Price | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | CDN, DNS, DDoS, Universal SSL |
| Pro | $25 / domain/mo | $20/mo billed annually; image optimization, 225 rules |
| Business | $250 / domain/mo | $200/mo billed annually; 100% uptime SLA, PCI DSS |
| Enterprise | Custom | Contract; 24/7 phone support |
| Workers Paid | $5 / mo | Minimum monthly charge per account; usage above included |
Source: www.cloudflare.com · checked on Oct 20, 2026
How Cloudflare compares in Security & identity
- Rank by votes
- #1 / 24
- Starting price
- $5
- Free alternatives
- 3
0 votes from members
37% below the category median ($8/mo)
Free or open-source tools in Security & identity
Cloudflare ranks #1 of 24 security & identity tools by community votes and is priced below most tools in the category.
Common use cases
- 1Putting DNS, CDN and WAF in front of any site for free
- 2Hosting a static site or Next.js app on Pages/Workers
- 3Storing user uploads in R2 without egress bills
- 4Zero-trust access to internal apps without a VPN
Best for
Anyone running a website, and developers who want edge compute and cheap storage.
Not ideal for
Teams needing the full breadth of managed services from a hyperscaler in one place.
Integrations
- GitHub (Pages)
- Vercel (DNS)
- Terraform
- Datadog
- Splunk
- Okta
- Google Workspace
- Any origin
Our take
Cloudflare belongs in nearly every stack, if only for DNS, CDN and R2. Its developer platform is the strongest alternative to Vercel plus AWS for edge-first apps.
FAQ
- What is Cloudflare?
- Cloudflare is a Security & identity tool: CDN, DNS, WAF and edge platform.
- How much does Cloudflare cost?
- Cloudflare uses a Freemium model; paid plans start at $5 per month.
- What does Cloudflare integrate with?
- Cloudflare integrates with GitHub (Pages), Vercel (DNS), Terraform, Datadog, Splunk, Okta and more.
- Which platforms does Cloudflare support?
- Cloudflare is available on web.
- Who is Cloudflare for?
- Anyone running a website, and developers who want edge compute and cheap storage.
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