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    Global Accelerator:Acceleration areas

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    Global Accelerator:Acceleration areas

    Last Updated:Oct 30, 2026

    An acceleration area contains one or more acceleration regions. An acceleration region is an entry point through which clients access the Global Accelerator (GA) network. GA assigns accelerated IP addresses to each acceleration region. Select acceleration regions based on client locations: choose the region where your clients are located or a nearby region. When you create a standard GA instance, select an accelerated IP address type. With EIPs, you select acceleration regions and configure their bandwidth. With Anycast EIPs, clients automatically connect through nearby access points, and you do not need to configure acceleration areas.

    Choose an access mode

    Standard GA instances support EIPs and Anycast EIPs as accelerated IP addresses. You cannot change the accelerated IP address type after the instance is created.

    Accelerated IP address type

    Elastic IP address (EIP)

    Anycast elastic IP address (Anycast EIP)

    Access mode

    Custom nearest access: you must select acceleration regions.

    Select acceleration regions where your clients are located or nearby, based on your business requirements. GA provides separate EIPs for each acceleration region.

    image

    Automatic nearest access: you do not need to select acceleration regions manually.

    GA provides two Anycast EIPs across multiple regions worldwide. Clients use these IP addresses to automatically connect to the Alibaba Cloud acceleration network through nearby access points.

    image

    Access point coverage

    Supported acceleration regions.

    Coverage depends on the access points supported by Anycast EIP. This mode primarily accelerates access outside the Chinese mainland. Clients in the Chinese mainland connect through China (Hong Kong).

    Billing method and number of accelerated IP addresses

    • Pay-as-you-go: two EIPs are assigned to each acceleration region. Both EIPs receive client traffic to provide high availability for the acceleration region.

    • Subscription: one EIP is assigned to each acceleration region.

    Anycast EIPs are available only for pay-as-you-go instances. Two Anycast EIPs are provided across multiple regions worldwide.

    IP version

    IPv4, IPv6, and dual-stack are supported. Select an IP version based on your clients. IPv6 and dual-stack are available only in specific acceleration regions.

    Dual-stack is available only for standard pay-as-you-go instances that use EIPs. The ISP line type must be BGP (Multi-ISP), and the listener routing type must be intelligent routing.

    Regions that support IPv6 and dual-stack

    The following table is for reference only. The regions available in the console take precedence.

    Acceleration area

    Regions

    North China

    China (Qingdao), China (Beijing), China (Ulanqab)

    South China

    China (Shenzhen), China (Heyuan), China (Guangzhou)

    East China

    China (Hangzhou), China (Shanghai)

    Southwest China

    China (Chengdu)

    North America

    US (Silicon Valley), US (Virginia), Mexico

    Asia Pacific

    China (Hong Kong), South Korea (Seoul), Singapore, Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur), Japan (Tokyo), Indonesia (Jakarta), Philippines (Manila), Thailand (Bangkok)

    Europe

    Germany (Frankfurt), UK (London)

    Only IPv4 is supported.

    Characteristics

    • Advantage: use DNS to route traffic based on latency and control path optimization.

    • Limitations: you must adjust acceleration regions and bandwidth as client distribution and traffic change. Each acceleration region uses separate EIPs, so this mode does not provide a unified IP entry point across regions.

    • Advantage: you do not need to select acceleration areas or regions. Client traffic automatically enters the network through nearby access points, which reduces operational complexity.

    • Limitation: nearest-access routing depends on cooperation with connected carriers and the coverage of Alibaba Cloud access points.

    Plan access bandwidth

    Traffic in each acceleration region is rate-limited based on its allocated bandwidth.

    Instance billing method

    Bandwidth billing method

    Bandwidth allocation limits

    Pay-as-you-go

    Pay-by-data-transfer

    • EIP: the bandwidth limit for each acceleration region can be set to 2~10000 Mbps.

    • Anycast EIP: a uniform bandwidth limit is configured for all acceleration regions. The range is 200~5000 Mbps.

    With pay-by-data-transfer billing, the bandwidth cap is used only for rate limiting. Cloud Data Transfer (CDT) bills the data transfer charges.

    Each accelerated IP address in an acceleration region has the same bandwidth limit as the region.
    GA uses a distributed, highly reliable cluster architecture. The forwarding capacity of a single connection is limited by the performance of a single CPU core on a data plane node. The configured bandwidth cap is distributed across multiple servers in the cluster. For workloads with high traffic volumes and long-lived connections, a single connection may not reach the instance bandwidth cap. Distribute traffic across multiple concurrent connections to make full use of the total bandwidth capacity of the GA instance.

    Subscription

    Pay-by-bandwidth

    • The sum of the bandwidth allocated to all acceleration regions must not exceed the bandwidth of the associated basic bandwidth plan.

    • The minimum bandwidth that can be allocated to each acceleration region is 2 Mbps.

    • The bandwidth configured for an individual acceleration region must not exceed the maximum bandwidth capacity of the GA instance specification. We recommend that the sum of the bandwidth allocated to all acceleration regions also remain within this limit. Otherwise, insufficient forwarding capacity may cause packet loss.

    The following bandwidth limits apply to endpoint group regions:
    For a subscription GA instance, traffic in each endpoint group region is rate-limited based on the maximum bandwidth capacity of the instance specification.
    For a pay-as-you-go GA instance, traffic in each endpoint group region is rate-limited based on the sum of the bandwidth allocated to all acceleration regions.

    Configure custom access with EIPs

    With custom nearest access using EIPs, you select acceleration regions and configure bandwidth. GA assigns separate accelerated IP addresses to each acceleration region.

    • Bandwidth cap: a cap that is too low may cause traffic to be rate-limited and packets to be dropped. Set the cap to meet your business requirements.

    • IP version: select a version based on your clients. IPv4 is the default. For IPv6, see Accelerate access from IPv6 clients to IPv4 services. Dual-stack allows both IPv4 and IPv6 clients to access the GA network.

    • ISP line type: this option is available only for pay-as-you-go instances that use EIPs. BGP (Multi-ISP) is the default and is supported in all acceleration regions. It connects to multiple carriers and automatically selects the optimal route. BGP (Multi-ISP) Pro is available only in China (Hong Kong) and Japan (Tokyo) and optimizes traffic from outside the Chinese mainland to the Chinese mainland.

    Console

    Pay-as-you-go instances

    1. On the Create Standard Instance (Pay-as-you-go) page, configure GA Instance Name and set Accelerated IP Address Type to EIP.

    2. On the Configure Acceleration Area page, select an appropriate Acceleration Area based on your client locations.

    3. For each selected acceleration region, configure the following settings based on your business requirements: Maximum Bandwidth, IP Protocol, and ISP Line Type.

    4. Follow the configuration wizard to complete the remaining steps and create the instance.

    After you create the instance, you can add or delete acceleration areas and modify bandwidth.

    • Add an acceleration area

      1. Go to the instance list in the GA console. For the target GA instance, in the Actions column, click Configure Acceleration Region.

      2. On the Acceleration Areas tab, click Add Acceleration Area:

        • Use Select Acceleration Region to select a region based on your client locations, then configure Bandwidth, IP Protocol, and ISP Line Type.

        • Assign Bandwidth supports Allocate Bandwidth by Region and Allocate Bandwidth. If you select Allocate Bandwidth, the bandwidth configured for the first region is also used for the remaining regions.

        • Cross-border Acceleration Settings: if this option is displayed, read Compliance Commitments Regarding Cross-border Data Transfers and select Agree to the Preceding Compliance Agreement.

          If cross-border services are not enabled for the GA instance, configure this setting when the following applies: This configuration is for cross-border acceleration between the Chinese mainland and regions outside the Chinese mainland, or between other countries and regions.

    • Delete an acceleration area: deleting an acceleration area releases its EIPs, which cannot be recovered. Adding the area again assigns new accelerated IP addresses; the old addresses cannot be reused. Before deletion, make sure that your business no longer depends on the accelerated IP addresses in the region, and check the relevant DNS records and client configurations.

      On the instance's Acceleration Areas tab, locate the target acceleration area and region. In the Actions column, click Delete and follow the prompts. After deletion, verify that the region has been removed from the list. GA no longer accelerates traffic for that region, so check the access paths still used by your business.

    • Modify bandwidth: on the instance details page, open the Acceleration Areas tab and click Edit Bandwidth. Change the access bandwidth for the target region and click OK. The supported allocation options are Allocate Bandwidth by Region and Allocate Bandwidth.

    Subscription instances

    1. On the Create Standard Instance (Subscription) page, select Instance Specification, configure GA Instance Name and set Accelerated IP Address Type to EIP.

    2. Go to the Bandwidth Plans page and click Purchase Basic Bandwidth Plan. After purchase, locate the basic bandwidth plan. In the Actions column, click Bind Instance, then Select Instance. After the plan is associated, its status changes to Available.

    3. Go to the instance list in the GA console. For the target GA instance, in the Actions column, click Configure Acceleration Region. On the Acceleration Areas tab, click Add Acceleration Area. Use Select Acceleration Region to choose a region, then configure Bandwidth and IP Protocol.

    After configuration, you can add or delete acceleration areas and modify bandwidth. The number of regions that can be added to a subscription instance is limited by the total bandwidth and the GA instance specification.

    API

    • Call CreateIpSets to add acceleration areas. Set AccelerateRegionId based on your client locations. For each selected acceleration region, configure IpVersion and Bandwidth based on your business requirements. For pay-as-you-go instances, use IspType to configure the ISP line type.

    • Call UpdateIpSet to modify one acceleration region, or call UpdateIpSets to modify multiple acceleration regions.

    • Delete: call DeleteIpSet to delete one acceleration region, or call DeleteIpSets to delete multiple acceleration regions.

    Configure automatic access with Anycast EIPs

    Anycast EIPs provide automatic nearest access. You do not need to configure acceleration areas.

    Console

    Pay-as-you-go instances

    1. On the Create Standard Instance (Pay-as-you-go) page, configure GA Instance Name and set Accelerated IP Address Type to Anycast EIP.

    2. On the Configure Acceleration Area page, configure a uniform Bandwidth.

    3. Follow the configuration wizard to complete the remaining steps and create the instance.

    After you create the instance, you can modify its bandwidth. On the instance's Acceleration Areas tab, next to Bandwidth, click Edit to change the access bandwidth for all acceleration regions.

    API

    • Call CreateAccelerator and set InstanceChargeType to POSTPAY to create a standard pay-as-you-go instance. Set AccessMode to Anycast for automatic nearest access using Anycast EIPs. Use Bandwidth to configure access bandwidth.

    • Call UpdateAccelerator to modify the access bandwidth specified by Bandwidth.