FlexCache is a read caching layer that sits between clients and the origin storage in a distributed environment. Its main purpose is to keep frequently accessed data close to users, so read I/O can be served from the local cache rather than traveling all the way to the origin, which reduces latency and frees up origin resources. When a client requests data, if it’s already cached, it’s returned quickly; if not, the system fetches it from the origin, stores it in the cache, and serves the request, so subsequent reads are faster. This behavior offloads read traffic from the origin and lowers latency, especially for hot workloads spread across multiple sites. It does not replace DR replication mechanisms like SnapMirror, which are about protecting data and keeping datasets synchronized across sites, whereas FlexCache speeds access. It’s also not required to replicate the entire dataset locally; the cache is populated on demand, so you don’t need full local replication to serve reads. Writes are not cached locally in the same way, so FlexCache mainly improves read performance rather than handling write traffic.