Vercel Edge Functions

Why edge?

Edge functions execute in Vercel's global runtime, close to your users. A license validation that takes 200ms from us-east-1 drops to 30ms when it runs in Frankfurt, Tokyo, or Sydney.

Middleware pattern

Place a middleware.ts at your project root. It fires on every request before your pages render.

export const config = {
  matcher: ['/dashboard/:path*'],
}

export default function middleware(req) {
  const token = req.headers.get('x-nimbus-key')
  if (!token) {
    return new Response('Missing license', { status: 401 })
  }
  // call Nimbus edge validator here
}

Nimbus edge validator

The edge validator is a lightweight fetch to Nimbus's globally replicated KV store. No database round-trip — just a key lookup.

const res = await fetch(
  'https://api.getnimbus.net/edge/validate',
  {
    headers: {
      'x-license-key': token,
      'x-fingerprint': req.headers.get('x-nimbus-fp'),
    },
  }
)

if (!res.ok) {
  return new Response('License invalid', { status: 403 })
}

Caching the result

Cache a successful validation for 60 seconds in a cookie or header so repeat requests skip the edge call entirely. Combine with stale-while-revalidate for the best UX.