Bunny.net

bunny.netcontributed by Samuele Ongaro

KEEP IT

The value is the network, the data or the infrastructure. Keep paying.

A content delivery network with edge storage, image optimisation and video streaming, priced well below the large providers.

Promptfree, for everyone, and the only version there is
Do not build this. Servers in dozens of cities is the entire product, and it is the cheapest one on this list.

You cannot rent points of presence, and even if you could, the bandwidth pricing here is far below what a cloud provider charges you directly. This is one of the few subscriptions where doing it yourself costs more.

WHAT TO DO INSTEAD
- Keep it, and use it properly. Most of the value is in configuration people never set

WHAT TO ACTUALLY DO, WHICH COSTS NOTHING

**Cache headers, which are where the wins are:**
- Hashed asset filenames with an immutable, year-long cache. Never revalidate a file whose name contains its own hash
- HTML with a short cache and stale-while-revalidate, so a visitor gets an instant page and a fresh one behind it
- Vary on Accept where you serve AVIF, WebP or JPEG by negotiation, or the wrong format reaches somebody
- A cache key that ignores irrelevant query parameters, because a tracking parameter otherwise fragments your cache into thousands of copies of the same file

**Before the network, reduce what you send:**
- Resize images to the sizes actually used. Serving a 4000-pixel image into a 400-pixel slot is the largest waste on most sites, and no network fixes it
- AVIF or WebP with a fallback, at a perceptually measured quality rather than a fixed number
- Compress text with brotli, and check that it is actually happening
- Self-host fonts, subset to the characters used, preloaded

**What to build, if anything:**
- An origin that sets correct headers and supports conditional requests and range requests properly
- A purge on deploy, keyed to what changed rather than everything
- A monitor that fetches a few assets from several places and records the time, so you know whether the network is doing its job

THE ONE-LINE VERSION
This is infrastructure you cannot build and should not want to. Spend the afternoon on cache headers and image sizes instead — that is where the speed actually is.

What you lose

  • Servers in dozens of cities, which is the entire product and cannot be built
  • Bandwidth costs far below what you would pay a cloud provider directly
  • Edge caching rules and purging without you running anything

If you would rather not build

  • Cloudflare's free tier
  • Proper cache headers on your own server
  • Any object storage with a CDN in front

What it costs

as published on their pricing page

PlanBilled monthlyBilled yearlyLast read
—$10/mo——

Their pricing page is where these came from. Seeing a different price? Tell us.

The escape hatch

open source · no votes, no paid placement

Varnish

$0

A caching reverse proxy for one location; not a substitute for a network.

varnishcache/varnish-cachefree · open source

Caddy

$0

Automatic TLS and sensible caching defaults on your own server.

caddyserver/caddyfree · open source

Why this verdict

our own opinion · changed only by a person

22/100

Verdict no at 22. A CDN is physical infrastructure. The useful work is making sure you need one, and most small sites do not.

History

tracked since 10 Aug 2026 · nothing is ever overwritten

Interest · last 30 dayspeak 2/day
views01230 Aug4 Sept9 Sept14 Sept19 Sept24 Sept28 Sept
— views— prompt copies none yet— votes none yet

Questions about Bunny.net

answered from the record above

Is Bunny.net free?

No — the plan we track is $10 a month. Pay as you go from around $0.01 per gigabyte with a $10 minimum monthly spend.

Can you replace Bunny.net by building your own?

KEEP IT. The value is the network, the data or the infrastructure. Keep paying. Replacement score 22 out of 100, build time longer than it saves. Read what you lose before you decide.

How much does Bunny.net cost?

$10 a month on Pay as you go — $120 a year. Recorded 10 Aug 2026.

What do you lose by replacing Bunny.net?

Servers in dozens of cities, which is the entire product and cannot be built; Bandwidth costs far below what you would pay a cloud provider directly; Edge caching rules and purging without you running anything. If any of those carry weight for you, keep paying.

Is there an open-source alternative to Bunny.net?

Yes: Varnish, Caddy. The prompt on this page is for when you want it your way instead.

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