Nature of Business and Basis of Presentation - Narrative (Details)	12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2014 segment server country network
Organization, Consolidation and Presentation of Financial Statements [Abstract]
Number of servers (in servers) (more than 170,000 servers)	170,000akam_NumberOfServers
Number of networks (in networks)	1,300akam_NumberOfNetworks
Number of countries with servers and networks (in countries) (over 100 countries)	100akam_NumberOfCountriesServersAreIn
Number of operating segments (in number of segments)	1us-gaap_NumberOfOperatingSegments

Number of operating segments. An operating segment is a component of an enterprise: (a) that engages in business activities from which it may earn revenues and incur expenses (including revenues and expenses relating to transactions with other components of the same enterprise), (b) whose operating results are regularly reviewed by the enterprise's chief operating decision maker to make decisions about resources to be allocated to the segment and assess its performance, and (c) for which discrete financial information is available. An operating segment may engage in business activities for which it has yet to earn revenues, for example, start-up operations may be operating segments before earning revenues.

No definition available.

Name:	us-gaap_NumberOfOperatingSegments
Namespace Prefix:	us-gaap_
Data Type:	xbrli:integerItemType
Balance Type:	na
Period Type:	duration