Masbad: Internet on WARP speed

EVER since Cloudflare launched its 1.1.1.1 DNS service and made it available to the public, I instantly jumped on it as soon as I found out about it. My workhorse laptop’s network configuration is set to use 1.1.1.1 as its DNS. Cloudflare’s promise to make your internet browsing experience so much more faster than the usual. And, as far as I’ve experience, I can say that it is faster. Relatively speaking.

So, what’s a DNS? Why do we need it? Here’s a video explainer from Techquickie.



So, going back.

To use Cloudflare’s 1.1.1.1 service on your mobile device, it used to be that you’ll have to input the server address manually into the network configuration settings of your device. And then the app came out both for iOS and Android. That was a God-send. It made things easier for everybody. You just have to launch the app, flick the switch (there’s only one) and everything else is automatic.

So, what made it faster for me? For one, Cloudflare has two servers based in the Philippines -- one in Manila, another in Cebu. And that means that if your device won’t have to get in touch with a far-away DNS server in order to get the right website address. Sure, you can just retain to use your ISP default DNS server but that can get bogged down and “slow" things down for you.

Do you ever notice that right after you hit enter to go a website, the wheels keep turning for quite a bit before the website you wanted to go to stars to appear? That “slowness” is more than likely because your DNS server isn’t delivering the needed info right away. The experience you get with Cloudflare is that things get zippier. Their DNS servers respond in a blink of an eye and, in turn, you “arrive” at the website you want to go to in a lesser amount of time.

You can check DNS server performance numbers at DNSPerf. Right off the bat, you’ll see there that of all the world’s authoritative DNS providers, Cloudflare’s the fastest.

What about speed while on a mobile connection? We all know the Philippines’ mobile internet connection speeds isn’t really the fastest out there. But, based on my own experience, that’s not really a big hurdle. Things are still as zippy (probably even zippier) when your device doesn’t have 1.1.1.1 configured into the system.

The biggest contributor here to the relative speed is that of Cloudflare’s servers. I don’t really know exactly how things are done there or how they engineered their servers. I just think that their servers are what can make or break their claimed speed. And in so far that I’ve been on the 1.1.1.1 DNS servers, I’ve not experienced any big slowdown at all.

So, the question now is should you install the app on your device or configure the DNS server into your laptops or desktops?

I think you should.

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