Tiered Cache Routing
Tiered cache improves cache hit rate by letting edge nodes consult a regional cache before going to your origin. This reduces origin pulls and stabilizes performance across geographies.
When Tiered Cache Helps
- You have a global audience
- Your origin is in one region (US/EU) and users are far away
- You publish often and want stable cache behavior
How to Validate
- Cloudflare analytics: cache hit ratio should improve.
- Origin logs: fewer requests from Cloudflare IPs.
- Edge header signals: public pages should show HIT after warm.
curl-edge-status.sh
curl -I https://example.com/
cloudflare-cache-hit.txt
cf-cache-status: HIT
Common Mistakes
| Mistake | Why It Hurts | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| TTL too short | Frequent misses | Use longer TTL and rely on purge hooks |
| Not pairing with APO/page cache | Tiered helps less if HTML isn't cached | Enable APO (or HTML caching rules) and origin page cache |
| Forgetting bypass rules | Breaks Woo/login flows | Keep bypass rules for cart/checkout/account and auth cookies |