# Fastly, what it is and how websites use it. Edge cloud platform focused on performance and programmability. Fastly offers a real-time CDN with instant cache invalidation and Compute@Edge for serverless at the network edge. Built on VCL and WebAssembly. - **Status:** Modern. Preferred CDN for technology companies. Outstanding cache invalidation speed and advanced edge computing capabilities. - **Category:** [Servers & Hosting](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server) - **First release:** 2011 - **License:** Proprietary - **Official website:** https://www.fastly.com - **Documentation:** https://docs.fastly.com - **Page:** https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/fastly ## Fastly on audited websites 263 of the 16,845 websites audited by be1st run Fastly (1.6%). That ranks it #12 of the 34 technologies in Servers & Hosting we have seen in audits. ### Websites running Fastly vs all websites - **Web score:** 74 (all websites 72) - **SEO:** 81 (all websites 79) - **Security:** 60 (all websites 59) - **Performance:** 71 (all websites 72) - **AI Readiness:** 30 (all websites 31) ### Most used in Servers & Hosting 1. [Cloudflare](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/cloudflare): 22% (3,772) 2. [Vercel](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/vercel): 22% (3,635) 3. [Google CDN](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/google-cdn): 16% (2,700) 4. [nginx](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/nginx): 14% (2,284) 5. [OpenResty](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/openresty): 10% (1,707) 6. [Apache HTTP Server](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/apache-http-server): 9.3% (1,574) 7. [jsDelivr](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/jsdelivr): 7.2% (1,221) 8. [cdnjs](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/cdnjs): 6.0% (1,019) 9. [Netlify](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/netlify): 5.8% (971) 10. [AWS CloudFront](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/aws-cloudfront): 5.1% (859) ## Google searches for “fastly” About 110,000 searches a month worldwide (Google Ads estimate). The bars show the 12 months from Oct 2025 to Sep 2026. - 2025-10: 60,500 - 2025-11: 74,000 - 2025-12: 201,000 - 2026-01: 301,000 - 2026-02: 201,000 - 2026-03: 135,000 - 2026-04: 110,000 - 2026-05: 74,000 - 2026-06: 60,500 - 2026-07: 49,500 - 2026-08: 49,500 - 2026-09: 60,500 Open in search trends: https://be1st.ai/analytics/trends?kw=fastly&direction=all ## Other technologies in Servers & Hosting - [unpkg](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/unpkg): 2.8% of websites - [BunnyCDN](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/bunnycdn): 1.2% of websites - [Microsoft IIS](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/microsoft-iis): 1.0% of websites - [LiteSpeed](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/litespeed): <1% of websites - [Caddy](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/caddy): <1% of websites - [Amazon S3](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/amazon-s3): <1% of websites - [Google Cloud](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/google-cloud): <1% of websites - [Varnish](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/varnish): <1% of websites - [Azure](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/azure): <1% of websites - [Hostinger CDN](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/hostinger-cdn): <1% of websites - [GitHub Pages](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/github-pages): <1% of websites - [Akamai](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server/akamai): <1% of websites [All 35 in Servers & Hosting](https://be1st.ai/technologies/server) ## Questions about Fastly ### What is Fastly? Edge cloud platform focused on performance and programmability. Fastly offers a real-time CDN with instant cache invalidation and Compute@Edge for serverless at the network edge. Built on VCL and WebAssembly. The be1st catalog lists Fastly under Servers & Hosting. License of Fastly: Proprietary. ### How many websites use Fastly? 263 of the 16,845 websites audited by be1st run Fastly (1.6%), as of 8 Nov 2026. ### When was Fastly first released? Fastly was first released in 2011. ### Is Fastly still a modern choice? Yes. Fastly counts as a modern technology. Preferred CDN for technology companies. Outstanding cache invalidation speed and advanced edge computing capabilities. ### What are the alternatives to Fastly? Technologies that do the same job as Fastly include Cloudflare, AWS CloudFront, and Akamai. Numbers: latest audit of each of 16,845 websites audited by be1st, as of 8 Nov 2026.