As we continue to expand the essential platform for you to build, host, and collaborate on one-of-a-kind websites and applications, we want to remind you of some of the features we launched this year.
Why now? Well, we’re approaching the halfway point of 2024 and with MACH THREE just around the corner, it seems as good a time as ever to reflect on the features that really make a difference for your business and workflows.
Specifically, we want to highlight the advancements we made for you across six areas:
- Security and compliance
- Platform primitives
- Next.js runtime
- Observability
- Visual Editor
- AI
Let’s get to it.
1. Enhancing security and compliance
Let’s cut to the chase: security is critically important. Whether your business manages private customer data or not, no one wants a security breach on their hands. You’ve worked hard to build trust with your customers and you don’t want to lose it.
Similarly, we work hard to build your trust in the Netlify platform. Here’s a snapshot of the security features we released so far this year.
Private connectivity
Traditionally, to leverage the next-level speed and framework-supported features of Netlify, you might have needed to expose some of those backend systems to the public internet. Private Connectivity eliminates that need, bridging your data and private systems. Now, you can secure the connection between your private systems (databases, CMS, internal APIs) and Netlify’s build and functions environment.
Learn more about Netlify’s Private Connectivity.
Security Scorecard
Making strides to build an ironclad website or application is important work. But how do you know if the fruits of your labor are truly paying off? Or even working at all?
To ensure the utmost security for your digital assets, and by extension, your organization, we’ve introduced the Security Scorecard into enterprise plans. Within your account, you can now monitor potential risks across several categories:
- Authentication
- Single sign-on (SSO)
- User management
- Site security
- Account settings
Learn more about Netlify’s Security Scorecard.
Rate Limiting
As always, our automated protections have long shielded your site from distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and blocked malicious clients. Now, with Rate Limiting, you can manually set granular limits—ensuring your websites remain responsive, secure, and efficient.
Learn more about Netlify Rate Limiting.
Enhanced Certificate Chain Validation
In February, we released an enhancement in certificate chain validation to ensure that TLS certificates are correctly configured and secure. We’ve witnessed firsthand the repercussions of incomplete certificate chains. When our customers upload the leaf certificate as the CA chain, which, while accepted, breaks the site in production, we knew something had to be done to remedy this.
Learn more about our enhanced validation measures.
2. Expanding the open web to everyone through Platform Primitives
When setting out on a new project, the frontend framework you choose to build with shouldn’t limit the scope of your project. We believe everyone should be able to get the most out of every framework—breaking down the idea of walled gardens where certain features and functionality are reserved for the frameworks that built them.
That’s why in April we released Netlify’s Platform Primitives:
- Netlify Image CDN: so you can transform images on demand without impacting build times
- Netlify Blobs: so you can ensure an integrated, zero-configuration approach to implementing multiple data stores with automated provisioning, configuration, and access controls
- SWR and Fine-Grained Cache Control: so you can create dynamic digital experiences leveraging advanced caching capabilities
📝I implemented the new image CDN from @Netlify for @icongalleries
— Jim Nielsen (@jimniels) April 8, 2024
Now rather than PNGs you get AVIFs (where supported) & the overall bandwidth drops significantly.
The API is very composable with the other primitives in Netlify’s stack. I give it a 👍https://t.co/cIuLSZ2dyf pic.twitter.com/KMdrTKmcfs
Learn more about the benefits of Netlify’s Platform Primitives. Or check out some cool things people have built primitives.
3. New Next.js runtime
In April, we released the new Next.js runtime v5—focused on improving site reliability, performance, and ease of maintenance for developers. This runtime reflects our commitment to improving support for Next.js sites and apps.
As part of this runtime update, users have full access to supported features including:
- App router
- Automatic fine-grained caching
- On-demand and time-based revalidation
- Image optimization
Learn more about the Next.js runtime.
4. Delivering more transparent observability
Managing your website can be complex. And frankly, worrying about how much data you’re using or traffic you’re accumulating, takes the fun out of development. To bring clarity to your business, we’re taking the guesswork and manual oversight out of the equation, so you can focus on building cool stuff.
Account usage insights
Account usage insights in your team’s billing section provide comprehensive visibility into your team’s usage data. Now, you can more easily:
- Spot trends and anomalies: Easily identify usage patterns and anomalies across various metrics, allowing you to proactively optimize your resources and performance. You can make informed billing and financial decisions by understanding usage trends and forecasting future needs.
- Analyse comprehensive data: Gain insights into critical aspects of your Netlify usage, including Sites, Bandwidth, Builds, Functions, and Members.
- Take action on extracted insights: Armed with valuable data, you can make informed decisions to optimize resource allocation, streamline workflows, and drive better outcomes for your projects and business.
Learn more about account usage insights.
Function Metrics
Function Metrics—available within the Metrics dropdown in the primary navigation at a site level—offers an analytics solution designed to help you optimize the performance of your site’s functions.
Learn more about Netlify Function Metrics.
5. Visual Editor
Cross-functional collaboration is essential for building exceptional digital experiences. However, without efficient workflows, these collaborations often lead to bottlenecks. Now, Stackbit is fully integrated within Netlify. This powerful combination delivers a seamless visual editing experience for sites built and deployed on Netlify, empowering content creators to take control.
Learn more about visual editing on Netlify.
6. AI
Last, but certainly not least, is our first advancement in integrating AI into our platform that extends way beyond chatbots and other common AI tools businesses are rolling out.
We’re sure you recall the frustration of when your deployment fails after hours of coding. The process of sifting through logs, diagnosing the issue, and then crafting a solution is painstaking, time-consuming, and energy-draining.
Now you can harness the power of AI to diagnose and solve deployment failures—with the click of a button.
Problems debugging your build?
— Netlify (@Netlify) March 7, 2024
AI can take a look.
Learn more here: https://t.co/v3bQ1pw6ic pic.twitter.com/7qDXzhPQJu
Learn more about how to fix a failed deployment with AI.
What’s next for Netlify’s Composable Web Platform?
As we look to the future, Netlify’s Composable Web Platform will continue to revolutionize how developers and business teams build and manage their digital experiences. Our vision is to empower users with tools that streamline workflows, enhance collaboration, and enable faster, more efficient development cycles.
In the coming months, we’re committed to advancing our platform with several key features.
These include:
- New templates with built-in visual editing—streamlining the process of creating sites for dedicated marketing campaigns and empowering marketers to build upon them independently.
- New Web Application Firewall with managed rulesets, along with enhanced monitoring and performance capabilities, to significantly enhance the security and performance of our platform, providing added value for our customers.
- Focus on improving the Extensions workflows, introducing new data integrations with the SDK, and seamlessly incorporating extensions into the Site Creation workflow and the “Deploy to Netlify” process.
- Exploration of innovative ways of leveraging AI to bridge the gap between creative content and structured web content, ensuring a more seamless and efficient content creation process.
By focusing on these enhancements, we’ll help our customers achieve their digital transformation goals and unlock new levels of productivity and innovation. Our commitment to extensions and integrations will bolster our platform narrative, facilitating comprehensive workflows and fostering valuable partnerships.
Stay tuned as we continue to innovate and deliver features that drive value, making it easier for you to build, deploy, and manage world-class digital experiences.
Curious about any of these features—new or old? Get in touch with one of our experts today.
