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CDN with bundled WAF and DNS plans · by Amazon Web Services

Amazon CloudFront

AWS's CDN with 750+ PoPs, sold either pay-as-you-go or as flat-rate plans from $0 to $1,000 that bundle WAF, DDoS protection, Route 53 DNS and no overage charges.

Visit aws.amazon.com ↗ Alternatives Free tier EU region
Amazon CloudFront homepage
§1

Overview

CloudFront is the content delivery network of Amazon Web Services. It fronts S3 buckets, load balancers, API Gateway or any public URL, serves cached content from 750+ points of presence, and carries uncached traffic to AWS origins over Amazon's network. Data transfer from AWS origins to CloudFront is free.

There are two ways to pay, chosen per distribution. Flat-rate plans, launched in November 2025, bundle the CDN with AWS WAF, DDoS protection, Route 53 DNS, CloudWatch Logs ingestion, edge compute and S3 storage credits for $0, $15, $200 or $1,000 a month with no overage charges. Pay-as-you-go bills per GB and per request by region and keeps its permanent free tier of 1 TB and 10 million requests a month.

Before choosing, compare features: logging starts at Pro, bot management, custom caching rules and an uptime SLA start at Business, and origin failover needs Premium. Pay-as-you-go gives access to every feature but costs vary with traffic and each AWS service is billed separately.

§2

Pricing and plans

Free tier · card required

Free flat-rate plan: 1M requests and 100 GB transfer a month with CDN, 5 WAF rules, DDoS protection and DNS (up to 3 per account). Pay-as-you-go also has a permanent 1 TB free tier.

At the limit Slows down No overage is ever charged; sustained use well past the allowance may be served from fewer edge locations.

Plan Price What you get
Free $0/mo 1M requests, 100 GB, 5 WAF rules, 5 GB S3 credit
Pro $15/mo 10M requests, 50 TB, 25 WAF rules, logging, 50 GB S3
Business $200/mo 125M requests, 50 TB, 50 WAF rules, bot management, uptime SLA, 1 TB S3
Premium $1,000/mo 500M requests, 50 TB (configurable), origin failover, 5 TB S3
Pay-as-you-go From $0.085/GB First 1 TB and 10M requests free each month; regional tiers
Custom Custom No usage limit; contact AWS

Flat-rate prices are per distribution per month, with no overage charges; traffic well above the allowance for a sustained period may be served from fewer edge locations. Lambda@Edge invocations are billed at pay-as-you-go rates on top of a plan. The pay-as-you-go per-GB rates did not render on AWS's pricing page when read; the $0.085/GB first-tier rate for North America and Europe comes from two current third-party summaries of that page (listed in sources). An AWS account (with a payment method) is required.

Source: aws.amazon.com/cloudfront/pricing/ · prices as published, excluding tax.

§3

What it does

Flat-rate plans
Free, Pro, Business and Premium plans bundle CDN, WAF, DDoS protection, DNS, logs and S3 credits with no overage charges.
AWS WAF
Included in flat-rate plans with 5, 25, 50 or 75 rules; bot management from Business.
Edge compute
CloudFront Functions and Lambda@Edge run code at the edge; Lambda@Edge is billed separately.
Free origin transfer
Data transfer from AWS origins such as S3 and ALB to CloudFront is not charged.
VPC origins
Keep applications in private subnets reachable only through CloudFront (Business and above on flat-rate plans).
API and IaC
Since September 2026 flat-rate plans can be managed through the CLI, SDKs, CloudFormation and CDK.
§4

Strengths and limitations

Strengths

  • Flat-rate plans remove overage risk and bundle WAF and DNS at $15 or $200 a month.
  • Large network of 750+ PoPs.
  • No charge for transfer from AWS origins to CloudFront.
  • Permanent pay-as-you-go free tier of 1 TB and 10M requests a month.
  • Wide set of AWS compliance programmes, including SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS and FedRAMP.

Limitations

  • No uptime SLA on the Free and Pro flat-rate plans.
  • Logging is not included in the Free plan, and custom caching rules need Business.
  • Sustained traffic far above a plan's allowance can be served from fewer or more distant edge locations.
  • Pay-as-you-go costs vary by region and are spread across several AWS services.
§5

Who it suits

Good for

  • Applications already hosted on AWS
  • Small sites wanting a free CDN with WAF and DNS included
  • Teams that want a fixed monthly CDN and security bill

Look elsewhere if

  • Teams avoiding AWS accounts and billing
  • Projects needing an SLA for under $200 a month
§6

Pricing history

  • CloudFront adds flat-rate plans with no overages

    Announced 2025-11-18: alongside pay-as-you-go, CloudFront distributions can use Free ($0), Pro ($15), Business ($200) or Premium ($1,000) monthly plans bundling WAF, DDoS protection, Route 53 DNS, logs and S3 credits with no overage charges. Source ↗

§7

Alternatives to Amazon CloudFront

Tool From Free option Stages
Cloudflare CDN, DNS, WAF and DDoS protection
$20/mo Free tier
DNSimple DNS hosting and domain management
$0.5/mo Paid
Gcore CDN Pay-as-you-go CDN with DNS and WAF
Usage-based Free tier
DigiCert DNS (DNS Made Easy) Managed DNS with SLA
$300/yr Paid
ClouDNS Managed DNS with free and low-cost plans
$2.95/mo Free tier
easyDNS Managed anycast DNS and registrar
$20/yr Paid

All CDN, DNS and edge security →

§8

Questions

Does CloudFront have a free tier?

Yes. The Free flat-rate plan covers 1M requests and 100 GB a month, and pay-as-you-go distributions get 1 TB and 10M requests free every month.

What do CloudFront flat-rate plans cost?

Free $0, Pro $15, Business $200 and Premium $1,000 per distribution per month, with no overage charges.

Is WAF included with CloudFront?

On flat-rate plans AWS WAF is included, with 5 to 75 rules depending on the tier. On pay-as-you-go it is billed separately.

Is data transfer from S3 to CloudFront free?

Yes. AWS states that data transfer from AWS origins to CloudFront is free.

Sources read for this page