Possible Cloudflare issues and suggestions on how to address them

The ShortPixel Image Optimizer (SPIO) plugin works well with Cloudflare. However, if you have problems using them together, please check these suggestions.

Firewall rules, Rate limiting, and Security level sections #

Please log in to your Cloudflare account and check the Firewall rules, Rate limiting rules and Security Level sections to see if the current settings might prevent our servers from accessing your website.

Custom rules #

Rate limiting rules #

Here is Cloudflare’s Rate Limiting documentation.

Security level #

IP Access Rules #

Make sure you whitelist our IPs (see here) and also make sure there are no country-specific restrictions for Germany (this is where our servers are located).

Remove the security captcha #

In some cases, we have found that there is a security captcha that needs to be disabled in your Cloudflare account, otherwise our optimization cloud will not be able to access the images.

Add your Cloudflare details in SPIO #

Add your Cloudflare details in the appropriate tab in the ShortPixel plugin settings. Learn more here.

Under Attack Mode #

If your website is in Under Attack Mode, our optimization cloud will most likely not be able to access your images to optimize them.

Please make sure to disable this mode before trying image optimization again – of course, only when you are no longer under attack 🙂

Cloudflare and WebP delivery #

Cloudflare may not work well with the WebP/AVIF delivery method “Without altering the page code (via .htaccess)”. In fact, if you have a free plan with Cloudflare, such solution does not work at all. You can read more about it here. Therefore, if you want to deliver your WebP/AVIF files with ShortPixel without any problems, we recommend you using an alternative delivery method. You can find more information here: How to serve WebP files using SPIO