Superfast WordPress for 2023
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Website speed is a major contributor to the success of a website. Website speed refers to the time it takes for a website to load its content, including text, images, videos, and interactive elements. It is a critical factor affecting user experience and website performance.
Studies have shown that website speed has a significant impact on user engagement, conversion rates, and search engine rankings. Website speed should be a top priority for website owners wanting to provide their site’s visitors with the best user experience possible.
Mobile usage and page speed
Almost sixty percent of worldwide internet traffic comes from mobile devices. Mobile usage in North America is a little lower, around fifty percent. Traffic from mobile may not yet be a full-sized elephant in the room, but it’s halfway there. Here are some motivating reasons to focus on improving mobile page load speeds.
- Google determined 53% of mobile site visitors will leave a page if it takes more than three seconds to load.
- Website conversions drop by around 5% with each second of load time.
- Almost 70% of consumers say page speed influences their buying decision about online retailers.
Mobile page loads take over seventy percent longer to load desktops. That’s a full six seconds longer before you see a mobile page. We fidget when a desktop page takes over one or two seconds. Think of the aggravation of waiting six to ten seconds for a mobile page to load.
Why are mobile products so slow? Here are some technical reasons:
- Network Speed: Cellular data speeds are usually considerably slower than desktops connected at cable or fiber speeds. In non-5G areas, cellular data speeds can average between 2-6 Mbps. Standard broadband internet service is 8-25 Mbps, with fiber speeds between 100-1000 Mbps.
- Latency: Network delays increase latency. Due to the mobile technology involved, latency in cellular data is higher than data delivered by cable or fiber. My own unscientific measurements showed cellular data with ping times of 83 ms and 7 ms of jitter.These latency measurements were only 11 ms and 3 ms with the same phone connected to a wireless broadband network.
- Processing Power: To help extend battery time, mobile processors are less powerful than desktops. So, even when using wireless network speeds on phones or tablets, expect slower loading.
Testing website speed
Before taking any steps to correct website speed issues, it’s important to determine how fast or slow the website is. There are several online tools for testing website speed. Check out PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, Pingdom, and WebPageTest. These tools analyze website performance and provide detailed reports highlighting the factors that affect website speed. The reports also offer suggestions about how to improve website speed.
Choosing a Web host
A reliable web host is crucial for improving website speed. A quality web hosting provider offers fast and reliable servers, ensuring websites load quickly. If your budget and technical expertise allow for it, avoid shared hosting plans. They can lead to slow website speed due to limited resources. Instead, opt for a VPS hosting plan that provides more resources for your website.
Here are two top performers for you to consider:
Kinsta – Infrastructure built on Google Cloud Platform’s Premium Tier Network and C2 Machines. Choose between 35 data centers. Stay secure with isolated technology, two strong firewalls, and advanced Cloudflare-powered DDoS protection.
SiteGround – Powerful platform recommended by WordPress.org and trusted by the owners of over 2,800,000 domains.
Optimizing images and videos
Optimizing images and videos is crucial for improving website speed. Reduce the size of images and videos by compressing them without affecting their quality. Next-gen formats like WebP or AVIF provide better compression when compared to the other web image formats. Older image extensions, PNG, BMP, GIF, and even .JPG should be replaced. WebP is a universal replacement for all older image formats including .PNGs with transparent backgrounds.
The storage size (on a disk drive) and the height and width are important items when saving images for websites. Images over 1MB in size can single-handedly add several seconds to page load times. Avoid publishing images larger than 500 KB (.5 MB).
Resizing images based on their location on the webpage is important, too. There is no good reason to add a 2400 px wide image in one column of a two-column page.
Photoshop is effective for cropping, and adjusting the height, width, and storage size of images. There are also plugins such as Smush, ShortPixel, or Robin image optimizer to optimize images automatically.
Enabling caching
Enabling caching can help improve website speed by storing frequently accessed data temporarily. Caching solutions can include browser caching, server-level caching, or using a caching plugin such as WP Super Cache or W3 Total Cache.
Server-level caching is a technique that involves storing website data in the server’s memory to reduce the number of requests made to the database. This technique can significantly improve website speed, especially for high traffic websites. Unfortunately, server caching isn’t available on all web hosts. It’s one more reason to choose a VPS hosting plan.
Be careful choosing plugins
The WordPress.org plugin repository contains over 54,000 plugins. I know website owners who are trying to use as many of them as possible. Always deactivate and delete unnecessary plugins. And seriously weigh the functions you hope to gain from adding a new plugin against the drop in performance caused by each addition. Each plugin you add will use server resources; some are lightweight while some are heavy users.
Limiting the number of plugins used on a website can help improve website speed. Plugins will load some number of files every time a page is loaded. Files are loaded even if the plugin is not used on the page being loaded. And some plugins load a significant number of files.
The page speed tools mentioned earlier will show how much delay each file adds to the total page load speed. If a plugin is dramatically impacting the page load speed, it’s time to test similar plugins for less resource use.
Implementing lazy loading
Lazy loading can help improve website speed by loading images and videos as the user scrolls down the page, rather than loading everything at once. This technique can help reduce the number of requests made to the server, improving website speed.
Since 2020 WordPress automatically lazy loads images by default. But like caching, there are opportunities to manually tweak a little more speed from image loading. Plugins like a3Lazy Load and Sitegrounds Optimiser allow manual image settings.
Content optimization
This involves optimizing website content such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code to reduce website load times. This technique helps by reducing file sizes, minifying code, and optimizing website design elements like fonts and graphics. Content optimization requires technical expertise and may require hiring a web developer.
Conclusion
Among site owners, visitors, and Google, no one likes a slow website. Three seconds of waiting decreases online customer satisfaction by about 16%.
Website speed is a primary driver in improving user experience, search engine rankings, and the overall success of your website. Slow-loading websites can lead to high bounce rates, reduced conversion rates, and a negative impact on SEO.
Implementing the above suggestions can make noticeable improvements in website speed. Incremental improvements from a continued focus on improving speed will enhance user experience and boost your profits.
References:
EXPLODING TOPICS “Internet Traffic from Mobile Devices (Apr 2023)” by Josh Howarth, April 3, 2023 https://explodingtopics.com/blog/mobile-internet-traffic
Google Ad Manager “Increase the speed of your mobile site with this toolkit” Oct 13, 2016 https://www.blog.google/products/admanager/increase-speed-of-your-mobile-site-wi/
Hubspot.com “11 Website Page Load Time Statistics You Need [+ How to Increase Conversion Rate]”
Captured 4/14/2023, https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/page-load-time-conversion-rates
Neil Patel “Average Page Load Times for E-commerce Websites”, Captured 4/14/2023, https://neilpatel.com/blog/average-page-load-time/
Smashing Magazine “How To Make Your Websites Faster On Mobile Devices”, Captured 4/14/2023, https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2013/04/build-fast-loading-mobile-website/
Make Tech Easier “Why Do Some Websites Take Longer to Load on Mobile Devices?”, Captured 4/14/2023, https://www.maketecheasier.com/websites-take-longer-load-on-mobile/
Kissmetrics infographic, “How Loading Time Affects Your Bottom Line” A PDF Captured 4/15/2023, https://blog.kissmetrics.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/loading-time.pdf
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