# TLS Acceleration

TLS acceleration, formerly known as SSL acceleration, is a method of offloading processor-intensive tasks, like those needed to establish and maintain a TLS session and the [initial key exchange](https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seguridad_de_la_capa_de_transporte#Intercambio_de_claves).

Most TLS (Transport Layer Security) accelerators use dedicated processing cards or custom chips ([ASICs](https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuito_integrado_de_aplicaci%C3%B3n_espec%C3%ADfica) and[ RISC](https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced_instruction_set_computing)).