Cloudflare and China — it depends on your filing path

Cloudflare is a special case. By default its global network serves China users from overseas POPs — workable for some sites, slow for others. The faster path, the Cloudflare China Network delivered via JD Cloud, is gated.

The default behavior

Without the China Network, mainland users are routed to the nearest overseas edge. Latency is better than a single far origin but worse than a domestic POP, and it varies by region and time of day.

The China Network requirements

To use Cloudflare’s mainland POPs you need two things: an ICP filing for the domain, and an enterprise plan. Neither is optional, and the filing is the longer pole.

The practical sequence

For most teams the order is filing-first, then route selection. Decide whether you need the China Network at all — many sites are better served by a different domestic route — before committing to the enterprise tier. The filing you complete is reusable across routes, so it is rarely wasted work.