XF 2.3 Cloudflare setup for XF Cloud instance

[UUD3]

I am new to the art of forum administration. So, please forgive if my explanations and asks are very simple:

I noticed that one of my XF cloud instances is already over 340,000 page-views, out of 400,000 that come with the subscription. This is surely bot traffic as I know there are not enough humans in the community to achieve that number.

I have gone to Cloudflare and set up a freebie account for it, running in "I am under attack" mode. This seems to have reduced the number of inhuman visitors from about 600 to about 60.

I see no reason to provide text for those 60, either, but the Cloudflare site is rather complicated and makes a lot of assumptions about my knowledge (which I freely admit I do not have).

I have read that XF has some CF integration capabilities and that XF member DigitalPoint has an excellent add-on, but this is also a swirl of words... lots of instructions but no guidance.

Would someone kindly please explain the basic configuration choices for XF/CF integration? (From what I can parse, I may want the 'Turnstile' option but I have no idea how to proceed.)

Thank you for any help.

PS. In case it makes things simpler, I am fine to block search engine spiders along with all the rest of the automated jackals; my fora are not a side-hustle.

 

[Sim]

Even a technical person like myself finds Cloudflare's UI overwhelming and sometimes confusing.

My advice is to ask your favourite AI Chat system (I prefer Claude) about how to use Cloudflare and ask it to step you through configuration. Tell it you don't know anything about how it works and it will explain it to you if you want to understand - or just give you simple instructions if you don't.

I went several steps further and have given Claude Code read-write access to my Cloudflare firewall rules via the API, so it can diagnose traffic patterns and manage the rules for me - but doing it by hand isn't difficult if you have someone (or an AI agent) pointing you at exactly where to go.

 

[Chris D]

I am new to the art of forum administration. So, please forgive if my explanations and asks are very simple:

I noticed that one of my XF cloud instances is already over 340,000 page-views, out of 400,000 that come with the subscription. This is surely bot traffic as I know there are not enough humans in the community to achieve that number.

I have gone to Cloudflare and set up a freebie account for it, running in "I am under attack" mode. This seems to have reduced the number of inhuman visitors from about 600 to about 60.

I see no reason to provide text for those 60, either, but the Cloudflare site is rather complicated and makes a lot of assumptions about my knowledge (which I freely admit I do not have).

I have read that XF has some CF integration capabilities and that XF member DigitalPoint has an excellent add-on, but this is also a swirl of words... lots of instructions but no guidance.

Would someone kindly please explain the basic configuration choices for XF/CF integration? (From what I can parse, I may want the 'Turnstile' option but I have no idea how to proceed.)

Thank you for any help.

PS. In case it makes things simpler, I am fine to block search engine spiders along with all the rest of the automated jackals; my fora are not a side-hustle.

To provide a little reassurance, the page view quotas are indicative only. There is no hard limit, no overages if limits are exceeded and usually not a sign that your plan needs to be upgraded.

It’s only one metric used to determine when to have a discussion about upgrading your plan. We also consider storage and server performance.

Ultimately, as long as the server is capable of supporting the traffic patterns of your forum comfortably, we’re happy.

 

[JustinHawk]

I am new to the art of forum administration. So, please forgive if my explanations and asks are very simple:

I noticed that one of my XF cloud instances is already over 340,000 page-views, out of 400,000 that come with the subscription. This is surely bot traffic as I know there are not enough humans in the community to achieve that number.

I have gone to Cloudflare and set up a freebie account for it, running in "I am under attack" mode. This seems to have reduced the number of inhuman visitors from about 600 to about 60.

I see no reason to provide text for those 60, either, but the Cloudflare site is rather complicated and makes a lot of assumptions about my knowledge (which I freely admit I do not have).

I have read that XF has some CF integration capabilities and that XF member DigitalPoint has an excellent add-on, but this is also a swirl of words... lots of instructions but no guidance.

Would someone kindly please explain the basic configuration choices for XF/CF integration? (From what I can parse, I may want the 'Turnstile' option but I have no idea how to proceed.)

Thank you for any help.

PS. In case it makes things simpler, I am fine to block search engine spiders along with all the rest of the automated jackals; my fora are not a side-hustle.

I suggest giving shot to @digitalpoint cloudflare addon >> https://xenforo.com/community/resources/digitalpoint-app-for-cloudflare-r.8750/

Enable guest page caching in same addon. It can help you decrease your pageviews on server side, as content to guest users will be served from cloudflare cache.

We also use cloudflare guest page caching using our inhouse add-on and it work really great in handling the forum load . Only 10-15% of traffic hits our server.

 

[Digital Doctor]

other key threads

Thread 'Crazy amount of guests'

Oct 12, 2025

I have a small forum, usually a few hundred guests at most. The last days the number of guests have been unusually high, around 3000 and climbing. We now have over 4800 guests. That's not normal. Many "Viewing unknown page" or "Latest content", with a warning sign. IP addresses are from all corners of the world. Many from south America, Brazil mostly. Also saw quite a number from Vietnam of all places, but everywhere else too.

We're on Cloud and I don't know what to do. Could we be under attack? We have been in the past, a few times I think. For reasons I cannot possibly fathom; we're a...

• Levina
• bot swarms guests
• Replies: 1,885
• Forum: Forum management

• 

Thread 'XF Bot Guard'

May 28, 2026

zeeb0t submitted a new resource:

XF Bot Guard - Challenge suspicious bots before they scrape your forum.

View attachment 338751

XF Bot Guard

Challenge suspicious bots before they scrape your forum.

XF Bot Guard is a XenForo-native anti-scraping and bot challenge layer designed to identify suspicious visitor behaviour, build reputation over time, and challenge risky traffic using XenForo’s own CAPTCHA system.

It is built for forum owners who are tired of anonymous crawlers, scrapers, aggressive bots, and repeat automated visitors...

Read more about...

• zeeb0t
• Replies: 1,158
• Forum: Add-on releases [2.x]

• 
• 

 

[UUD3]

To provide a little reassurance, the page view quotas are indicative only. There is no hard limit, no overages if limits are exceeded and usually not a sign that your plan needs to be upgraded.

It’s only one metric used to determine when to have a discussion about upgrading your plan. We also consider storage and server performance.

Ultimately, as long as the server is capable of supporting the traffic patterns of your forum comfortably, we’re happy.

Thank you. (Still and all, it is a kind of a promise so I am trying to do my part.)

 

[UUD3]

I suggest giving shot to @digitalpoint cloudflare addon >> https://xenforo.com/community/resources/digitalpoint-app-for-cloudflare-r.8750/

Enable guest page caching in same addon. It can help you decrease your pageviews on server side, as content to guest users will be served from cloudflare cache.

We also use cloudflare guest page caching using our inhouse add-on and it work really great in handling the forum load . Only 10-15% of traffic hits our server.

View attachment 347543

Thank you for the tip. (I have DM'ed DigitalPoint already, too.)

 

[UUD3]

other key threads

Thread 'Crazy amount of guests'

Oct 12, 2025

I have a small forum, usually a few hundred guests at most. The last days the number of guests have been unusually high, around 3000 and climbing. We now have over 4800 guests. That's not normal. Many "Viewing unknown page" or "Latest content", with a warning sign. IP addresses are from all corners of the world. Many from south America, Brazil mostly. Also saw quite a number from Vietnam of all places, but everywhere else too.

We're on Cloud and I don't know what to do. Could we be under attack? We have been in the past, a few times I think. For reasons I cannot possibly fathom; we're a...

• Levina
• bot swarms guests
• Replies: 1,885
• Forum: Forum management

• 

Thread 'XF Bot Guard'

May 28, 2026

zeeb0t submitted a new resource:

XF Bot Guard - Challenge suspicious bots before they scrape your forum.

View attachment 338751

XF Bot Guard

Challenge suspicious bots before they scrape your forum.

XF Bot Guard is a XenForo-native anti-scraping and bot challenge layer designed to identify suspicious visitor behaviour, build reputation over time, and challenge risky traffic using XenForo’s own CAPTCHA system.

It is built for forum owners who are tired of anonymous crawlers, scrapers, aggressive bots, and repeat automated visitors...

Read more about...

• zeeb0t
• Replies: 1,158
• Forum: Add-on releases [2.x]

• 
• 

Thank you for the reference to Bot Guard. I'll read into it some more.

(I had found that thread but, with 1800+ replies, it is the poster child for dazzlement and confusion.)