{"id":16184,"date":"2026-08-20T02:10:29","date_gmt":"2026-08-20T02:10:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/?p=16184"},"modified":"2026-09-15T10:21:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T10:21:11","slug":"hostinger-cdn-vs-cloudflare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/hostinger-cdn-vs-cloudflare\/","title":{"rendered":"Hostinger CDN vs Cloudflare"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hostinger CDN<\/a> and Cloudflare<\/a> are both Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) that speed up your website and protect it from attacks. Hostinger CDN is built into Hostinger dashboard and works without any external account, while Cloudflare is a third-party service managed from its own dashboard. Only one CDN should be active for a website at a time, so compare the two options and switch between them safely.<\/p>

Differences between Hostinger CDN and Cloudflare<\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Aspect<\/th>\nHostinger CDN<\/th>\nCloudflare<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n
Setup<\/td>\nEnabled with one click in Hostinger dashboard<\/td>\nRequires a Cloudflare account and nameserver change<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Nameservers<\/td>\nDomain must use Hostinger nameservers<\/td>\nDomain must use Cloudflare nameservers<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Management<\/td>\nHostinger dashboard CDN dashboard<\/td>\nCloudflare dashboard<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Caching and analytics<\/td>\nIncluded<\/td>\nIncluded<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Image optimization<\/td>\nWebP compression and smart image optimization included<\/td>\nCloudflare Images, with usage limits that vary by plan<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Security<\/td>\nSecurity levels, Under Attack mode, IP and country blocking, DDoS protection<\/td>\nSimilar features managed at Cloudflare<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
SSL<\/td>\nHandled automatically by Hostinger<\/td>\nManaged in the Cloudflare dashboard<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Availability<\/td>\nPremium Web, Business Web, Cloud, and Agency hosting plans<\/td>\nAny hosting provider<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>
Hostinger CDN is available on Premium Web, Business Web, Cloud, and Agency hosting plans, and is not available for VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting. Websites built with Hostinger AI Builder are optimized automatically.<\/div>

Why only one CDN should be active for a website<\/h2>

Running Cloudflare in front of Hostinger CDN is not a supported setup — avoid the combination. There are three common problems with a double-CDN setup: redirect loops from conflicting HTTPS rules, stale content because two separate caches must be purged, and incorrect visitor IP addresses in analytics and security tools.<\/p>

Hostinger CDN requires the domain to use Hostinger nameservers<\/a> for full functionality, but a domain on Cloudflare nameservers can still route traffic through Hostinger CDN if its DNS records point to the Hostinger CDN CNAME or CDN IP addresses instead of the IP address of your hosting plan. This is the most common cause of a double-CDN setup, and Hostinger applies a rate limit to traffic confirmed as passing through both CDNs at once.<\/div>

How to identify and resolve a double-CDN rate limit<\/h3>

Run `curl -IL domain.tld` and check the response headers. A domain running both CDNs at once returns both the `x-hcdn-cache-status` and `cf-cache-status` headers in the same response. Choose one CDN to resolve a double-CDN rate limit: use Hostinger CDN only, or use Cloudflare only. See How to switch from Cloudflare to Hostinger CDN<\/strong> or How to switch from Hostinger CDN to Cloudflare<\/strong> below for setup steps.<\/p>

How to switch from Cloudflare to Hostinger CDN<\/h2>
    \n
  1. Open the DNS<\/strong> (Domain Name System) records of the domain in the Cloudflare dashboard and copy every record you still need, such as MX records for email and TXT records for verification.<\/li>\n
  2. Recreate the copied records in the Hostinger DNS zone<\/a>, and confirm the A record points to the IP address of your hosting plan<\/a>.<\/li>\n
  3. Point the domain domain.tld<\/code> to Hostinger nameservers<\/a> at your domain registrar. Nameserver changes take up to 24 hours to propagate<\/a>.<\/li>\n
  4. After the domain resolves through Hostinger nameservers, go to Hostinger dashboard → Websites → Dashboard → Performance → CDN<\/strong>.
    \n\"\"<\/li>\n
  5. Click Enable<\/strong>.
    \n\"\"<\/li>\n
  6. Verify the switch by checking the response headers of your website: responses delivered through Hostinger CDN include the x-hcdn-cache-status<\/code> header.<\/li>\n<\/ol>

    How to switch from Hostinger CDN to Cloudflare<\/h2>
      \n
    1. Go to Hostinger dashboard → Websites → Dashboard → Performance → CDN<\/strong>.
      \n\"\"<\/li>\n
    2. Click Disable<\/strong>.
      \n\"\"<\/li>\n
    3. Set up Cloudflare for the domain following the guide How to set up Cloudflare for a domain hosted on Hostinger<\/a>.<\/li>\n
    4. During the Cloudflare setup, review the DNS records Cloudflare imports and confirm the A, MX, and TXT records are complete before switching nameservers, so the website and email keep resolving.<\/li>\n<\/ol>
      Disable Hostinger CDN before pointing the domain to Cloudflare nameservers. Skipping this step can cause redirect loops and SSL errors during the transition.<\/div>

      Both services keep your website fast and protected — Hostinger CDN with zero-configuration integration in Hostinger dashboard, Cloudflare with management in its own dashboard. With one CDN active at a time, your website avoids cache conflicts and redirect loops.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Compare Hostinger CDN and Cloudflare and learn why only one should be active<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":594,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"include_on_kodee":true,"footnotes":""},"categories":[262],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cdn"],"hreflangs":[],"include_on_kodee":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/594"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16184"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16184\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18018,"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16184\/revisions\/18018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/support\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}