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Smart Shield

This functionality is now offered as part of Cloudflare's origin server safeguard, Smart Shield. Learn more.

Argo Smart Routing speeds up your global traffic by routing requests across the fastest network paths available.

Dashboard

To enable Argo Smart Routing ↗ in the dashboard:

1. In the Cloudflare dashboard, go to the Argo Smart Routing page.

   Go to Argo Smart Routing

2. For Argo Smart Routing, switch the toggle to On.

3. Provide your billing information.

   • If you do not have a billing profile, enter your billing information.

   • If you have a billing profile, confirm your billing information.

API

To enable or disable Argo Smart Routing with the API, send a PATCH request with the value parameter set to your desired setting ("on" or "off").

You will need to already have a billing profile on your account to enable Argo Smart Routing.

Note

Enterprise customers can preview this product as a non-contract service, which provides full access, free of metered usage fees, limits, and certain other restrictions.

Billing

If Cloudflare mitigates attacks on your site - whether through DDoS protection, the WAF, or other mechanisms - that traffic will not be included in any charges for Argo Smart Routing.

Since this is a service with usage-based billing, Cloudflare recommends that you set up usage-based billing notifications to avoid unexpected bills.

To set up those notifications:

1. In the Cloudflare dashboard, go to the Notifications page.

   Go to Notifications

2. On Alert Type of Usage Based Billing, click Select.

3. Fill out the following information:

   • Name
   • Product
   • Notification limit (exact metric will vary based on product)
   • Notification email

   Note

   Some plans also have access to alerts through PagerDuty and Webhooks.

4. Select Save.

Enable Tiered Cache

Cache works by storing a copy of website content at Cloudflare's data centers. Tiered Cache organizes these data centers into a hierarchy based on location. This behavior allows Cloudflare to deliver content from data centers closest to your visitor.

When used together, Argo Smart Routing optimizes the network path between Cloudflare data centers and your origin, while Tiered Cache reduces the number of requests that reach your origin. For more information, refer to Tiered Cache.