Smart Multi-CDN Switching for Video Streaming

NPAW’s CDN Balancer helps streaming services improve QoE and optimize their video delivery, automatically selecting the best CDN based on perceived quality and business needs

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What is smart multi-CDN switching?

NPAW’s CDN Balancer is a smart multi-CDN switching and monitoring tool built for video streaming. It tracks CDN performance in real- time at the end-user level to choose the optimal CDN to deliver a smooth viewing experience and meet your needs. CDN Balancer can select the best CDN at the start of the stream or change CDNs mid-stream to avoid outages and prioritize quality or business goals. 

Improve Quality of Experience and Service

Ensure a seamless streaming experience by minimizing buffering and video start issues, switching to the CDN offering the best quality and lowest latency for each user

Adapt video delivery to your business needs

Identify the best M-CDN strategy for your business goals and easily define custom decision-making progress by setting up security, business, and performance rules

Optimize delivery for costs while protecting quality

Leverage cost-effective CDN providers without risking service quality or availability. Use the most cost-effective CDN while it ensures your target video quality: if it goes below your goal, automatically switch to other CDNs.

Active mid-stream CDN switching 

Take your QoE to the next level by automatically selecting the best-performing CDN for every chunk of video

Automated chunk-level CDN selection

Download in parallel video chunks from different CDNs, with real-time and bidirectional communication between the client-side plugin and the server-side platform 

CDN Balancer not only helps us tailor our CDN consumption to each of our audience segments’ needs, but it also lets us control costs and allocate our infrastructure resources in a way that’s not only beneficial for us, but gives our end users a better streaming experience.

Niklas Hammarbäck

Product Manager

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Hands-off CDN active balancing

Optimize CDN selection for each chunk of video

Use the best CDN for each segment of video with automated decision-making based on your needs

Prioritize quality or business goals

Choose to select the CDN providing the highest QoE at all times or prioritize CDNs that meet business goals like price at a target quality

Test new CDNs and offload during peak demand

Try new delivery options while ensuring service quality. Offload traffic during peak demand and minimize your private infrastructure investment

KPI improvements after implementing Active Switching

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Buffer Ratio

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Start-up Errors

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In-stream Errors

The benefits of NPAW’s CDN Active Switching

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Outage-free, high QoE guarantee

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Flexible delivery based on your goals

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Cost optimization at the chunk level

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Easy, zero latency integration

Optimize multi-CDN infrastructure for better QoS

Improve your M-CDN strategy

Analyze which of your currently used CDNs are performing well in real time. Know which is delivering the best user experience at which time and in which region.

Answer ‘what is my best CDN?’ with a CDN scoring tool

Know if your content is being delivered by the best performing CDN for any ISP and in any region. And use our scoring tool to generate a score for all CDNs.

Monitor alternative CDNs in real time

Check if switching to a different CDN would improve the user’s perceived quality of experience.

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How Viaplay and NPAW built a smart M-CDN switching tool for video streaming

Learn how Viaplay, one of the leading European streaming services, and NPAW built CDN Balancer: a powerful, flexible, and resilient M-CDN balancing solution that automatically selects the best CDN according to business and audience requirements.

Improve your CDN strategy with NPAW

Contact us to receive a free product demo. Understand how your CDN strategy impacts your product.