Easily compare Gcore and Lumen for POP locations, products, pricing, features & support. We hope this helps you better understand the similarities and differences between these content delivery networks.
Company
| Company | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| Short profile | Gcore is a global CDN with a focus on gaming: "We expand the geographical presence of your game and speed up downloads for your players". Gcore is headquartered in Luxembourg and employs 400+ people. | Lumen (formerly known as Centurylink or Level 3) owns and operates a global Tier-1 network and - logically - their CDN runs on top of it. Lumen CDN has POPs on many continents and their product focus is on video, large object delivery and edge computing. |
Products
| Product | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| Dynamic content deliveryNon-cacheable content delivery. User login, shopping cart ... | CDN Edge Compute | |
| Small file deliveryStatic object delivery; caching of small files (file size <1 MB) | CDN and/or CDN Edge Compute | |
| Large file deliveryStatic object delivery; caching of large files (file size >1 MB) | ||
| Live videoDelivery of live video. RTMP? Transcoding/transmuxing? | Live Streaming | CDN and/or CDN Mesh Delivery |
| Video on demandDelivery of on demand video | VoD | CDN and/or CDN Mesh Delivery |
| Image OptimizationAutomatic image transformation/compression/optimization | Image Stack | part of CDN Edge Compute |
| DNSAuthoritative DNS for customer domain | DNS | |
| WAFWeb Application Firewall | WAF | WAF |
| Anti-DDoSDDoS attack protection. Specific product(s) for this. | DDoS Protection | Lumen DDoS Hyper (on-demand) and DDoS Mitigation Service |
| Private CDNDedicated edge resources & custom configs | CDN Mesh Delivery for Enterprise | |
| Edge ComputeRun your code on CDN edge servers | Edge Compute |
Network
How many POP locations do Gcore and Lumen have in different parts of the world?
| Region | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| North America | 17 | 28 |
| Latin America | 23 | 11 |
| Europe | 31 | 35 |
| Russia & CIS | 14 | 0 |
| Asia excl. China | 21 | 7 |
| China | 0 | 0 |
| Oceania | 4 | 5 |
| Middle East | 12 | 4 |
| Africa | 23 | 3 |
Pricing
| Pricing & contract duration | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum contract term | One month | Unknown |
| Minimum monthly costs | $37 | Unknown |
| Requests costsCustomers pay for client to CDN requests | First 1 billion free, more cost $0.0079/10,000 | Unknown |
| Ingress costsCustomers pay for origin-to-CDN bytes transferred | Yes | Unknown |
| NA/EU traffic (low volume) | $0.024 per GB | Unknown |
| APAC traffic (low volume) | $0.024 per GB | Unknown |
| LATAM traffic (low volume) | $0.024 per GB | Unknown |
Features
| Web acceleration | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| Instant setupSign up, configure, start testing. | Not yet, but coming soon. | |
| Change propagation delayHow fast do config changes propagate to all POPs? | ~15 minutes | No longer than 15 minutes - Often instant |
Apex/root domain OK  No performance degradation when using http(s)://domain.com |
Custom solution (host your DNS zone ...) | Available with Section product for an additional fee |
| HTTP/2 | ||
| HTTP/3 | ||
| WebSockets | WebSockets docs | |
| IPv6Do the edge servers have IPv6? | ||
| Compression Reduce file size for faster delivery |
Resend from origin, or compress on edge | Resend from origin, or compress on edge |
| Origin pull - protocolHTTP only or HTTPS possible too? | HTTP and HTTPS | HTTP and HTTPS. |
| Origin pull - Host headerUse client > edge value? Set specific value? | Can be different from origin host |
Configure specific other Host header
CDN can also forward client request Host header to origin
|
| Origin ShieldOne POP pulls from origin, other POPs pull from the shield POP | Enable and configure Origin shielding | |
| Waiting RoomDuring peak traffic, route users to a virtual waiting room | ||
| Push / uploadStore your content directly on CDN, no customer origin | FTP, SFTP, rsync. Storage costs apply | |
| Cache control - CDN caching | Origin or CDN controlled | |
| Cache control - client caching | Origin or CDN controlled | |
| Serve Stale CDN serves cached but expired content in case origin is in trouble |
Always Online | |
| Purge Invalidate or delete cached objects on CDN |
Purge Speed | Instant |
| Purge - capabilities | Purge all, directory, and by file type/pattern | Purge all but not purge by directory or tag or header |
| Analytics | Many metrics, real-time updates | |
| Log files | Export logs to your storage. Logs are exported at the end of each hour. | |
| API | Purge, analytics, configuration | Purge, analytics, configuration |
| HTTPS & Content Protection | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| CDN domain HTTPSUse the CDN's domain, like cloudfront.net | ||
| Customer domain HTTPSYour domain in the CDN's certificate | ||
| Customer cert HTTPSYour certificate on the CDN | Manage self in control panel | |
| Token authentication | Secure Token | |
| Geo blocking | Country Access Policy | |
| Hotlink protectionThird parties cannot deeplink to your content | Referer Access Policy | |
| Basic authenticationUser logs in on the CDN to get content | ||
| IP white/blacklisting | IP Access Policy |
Support
| Customer support | Gcore | Lumen |
|---|---|---|
| Documentation | Yes, public | Yes, but not public |
| Humans | Technical support depends on price plan. Pro plan and up get 24/7 mail, chat and phone support. |