Purged the Cloudflare cache but users still see the old page

Purged but nothing changed

A purge clears Cloudflare's edge cache for exactly what you asked to purge. When users still see the old content, one of these is true:

1. Browser cache

Purge does not touch the visitor's browser. If the response had a long browser TTL (Cache-Control: max-age), users keep the old copy until it expires. Fix the TTL design going forward; for the immediate incident, versioned URLs (/app.v2.js) are the only reliable bust.

2. Wrong scope

• Purged https://example.com/page but the user visits https://www.example.com/page: different hostname, different cache entry. Purge by hostname or include every variant.
• Purged the URL without the query string, but the cached entry includes one (or vice versa): the cache key did not match.
• Purged one zone but the content is served from another (apex vs www on different zones, or a SaaS custom hostname).

3. The origin still serves the old content

Purge refills from the origin. If the origin (or the deploy) still has the old file, the edge faithfully re-caches the old file. Verify the origin directly, bypassing Cloudflare, before purging again.

4. Purge everything is still propagating

Large purges take time to reach every edge location. Wait, then check CF-Cache-Status from multiple regions.

Checklist

• Confirm the origin serves the new content first (bypass Cloudflare).
• Purge the exact cache key: scheme, hostname, path, and query-string behavior.
• Remember the browser: edge purge plus versioned assets, or the fix is invisible to users.