What is Salesforce Edge Network?

Multiple factors determine how fast your Salesforce page can load. It could be either your connection or factors that are the responsibility of the Salesforce admin. The release of Salesforce Edge Network in 2023 addressed the latter factor. The new release came with notable improvements to make Salesforce operations more secure and smooth.

What is Salesforce Edge Network?

The Salesforce Edge Network is designed to reduce the load on connections by processing data through Amazon Web Services infrastructure. This allows an end-to-end secure connection, consistent with TLS connections, and restricts caching to the content featuring HTTP headers categorized as cacheable. This makes Salesforce services more accessible to users on Salesforce infrastructure irrespective of their locations.

The latest release in August 2023 introduced an auto-enablement feature to the org. Additionally, users modify routing options on “My Domain” from the setup page.

How Does Salesforce Edge Network Work?

Traditionally, the network requests are sent to the Salesforce data center. However, with Salesforce Edge Network, these requests are directed to the nearest location where the Edge Network is accessible. At that location, it delivers many services closer to customers, reducing the round-trip time for specific requests. These requests are sent to the Salesforce data center using secure, high-bandwidth connections.

• TLS termination: Transport Layer Security (TLS) establishes secure connections to Salesforce. Salesforce Edge Network facilitates end-to-end secure connections that is combined by reliable TLS connections and reinforced setup, reducing the time to set up a connection.
• Caching of static content: Caching is limited to the content with HTTP headers marked as cacheable by Salesforce or customer integrations. This content is typically publicly available content such as JavaScript and CSS files.
• Intelligent routing: Salesforce automatically sends users to the most optimal point of presence based on its network data.
• TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) optimizations: TCP optimizations assist in moving data more swiftly across various networks.

Who Does Salesforce Edge Network Cater to?

• Customers who have Sales and Service Cloud orgs and who have enabled My Domain can use the Salesforce Edge Network.
• Public Cloud and Salesforce Government Cloud orgs are currently not included in the move to the Salesforce Edge Network.

What Preparation is Needed for an Org to Move?

Deploy a My Domain

If you are looking to completely migrate your org to the Salesforce Edge Network, you must install and deploy a My Domain. When doing that ensure that you use the same across the org. It is not a mandatory aspect; however it will make things easier for you in the future. Thereafter all production and sandbox orgs will be enabled with Salesforce Edge Network.

Allow Salesforce IP addresses (if needed)

If your corporate network settings or email security filters restrict access to IP ranges or addresses, then ensure that you include the current ranges of Salesforce. All the current IP ranges of Salesforce are available, and you can search in the article named ‘What are the Salesforce IP Addresses & Domains to’.

Activate some of the critical updates (if needed)

• Stabilize URLs that are for Visualforce, Experience Builder, Site.com Studio, and Content Files.
• Stabilize the Hostname for My Domain URLs in the Sandbox environments.

These updates are not accessible to all production orgs. So if they don’t show in your production org, feel free to skip them.

Conclusion

Organizations are moving forward to adopt the Salesforce Edge Network to have enhanced user experience, consistent delivery of quality content, and better download times for users from across the globe. It redirects requests to the closest Salesforce location where the Salesforce Edge Network is deployed, hence providing information faster and always making it available.