How does a CDN improve application performance?

CDN (Content Delivery Network) caches content at edge locations worldwide, serving users from nearby servers. Performance benefits: reduced latency (shorter physical distance), decreased origin load, improved availability (distributed, redundant). Content types: static files (images, CSS, JS), video streaming, API responses (edge caching). Providers: Cloudflare, Akamai, CloudFront. Additional features: DDoS protection, SSL termination, compression. Essential for global applications and media delivery.