How to Speed Up Your Website
Meta – How to improve your website loading speed with easy-to-follow tips
You’ve clicked on a link and now you’re waiting. And waiting. And finally you give up. Maybe it was 3 seconds or maybe 5. Either way, you didn’t like it.
The same goes with your visitors. It’s not just about speed but how long it takes them to stay on your site, read your content and convert. Google has also mentioned that page experience metrics such as speed are now part of how they rank sites. The good news is that most websites can be improved substantially with a few easy fixes.
1. Test Your Site
Start off by finding out what is causing your site to run slowly.
Use Google PageSpeed Insights – This will give you an overall score and recommendations.
Use Google Search Console – Check your Core Web Vitals reports.
Use GTmetrix or WebPageTest – For more in-depth reports.
Check your homepage and 1-2 key pages. This will help you know if your changes have helped.
2. Know What Core Web Vitals Are
Google care about 3 key metrics:
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) – How quickly your main content loads.
Interaction to Next Paint (INP) – How quickly your page responds to tapping/clicking.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) – Whether your page moves around.
You don’t need to remember what these are. Just aim to make sure that your pages load quickly, respond quickly and don’t move around. Your testing tools will show you which areas you’re missing out on.
3. Optimize Your Images
Large images are one of the most common reasons why websites are slow.
Resize your images to the actual size they are shown.
Compress your images using a free tool.
Use new image formats such as WebP. These are often much smaller than JPEG or PNG.
Lazy load your images. This means images that are not on screen will only load when they come into view.
Add width and height to your images.
If you only do one thing from this list, start here.
4. Get A Good Host
This will help your server speed. If you are on a very cheap shared host you may have issues with your site being slow. If you’ve tried everything else and your site is still slow, consider upgrading to a better shared host, managed WordPress host or a VPS. See our hosting guide on how to choose.
5. Use Caching
Caching means that your pages will be saved as a ready to go version so they won’t have to be rebuilt each time.
On WordPress install a reputable caching plugin.
Many hosts offer caching on their server.
Browser caching will cache files for returning visitors.
6. Use A CDN
A content delivery network will save copies of your files on different servers worldwide. This means that your visitors will get the closest server to them. This is a great option if your audience is from many different countries. Many CDNs offer a free plan which is suitable for smaller sites.
7. Minify Your Code/Plugins
All of the extra scripts, plugins and tracking will slow your site.
Remove any plugins/themes you aren’t using.
Ask yourself if you really need all of your plugins. Can you do without?
Minify your CSS and JavaScript. This removes any extra characters.
Don’t use heavy scripts such as chat widgets, popups or multiple trackers on all pages if you don’t need to.
Try to limit third party embeds. These can slow your site down as they are from another server.
8. Optimize Your Fonts
While custom fonts look great they can cause your site to load slowly.
Only use 1-2 font families and a limited number of weights.
Optimize your fonts. Use quick loading fonts such as preloading key fonts or using system fonts where possible.
9. Keep Everything Updated
Keep your CMS, themes and plugins updated. Often updates will include performance and security improvements.
If using WordPress, clean your database. Remove old revisions, spam comments and expired data.
Fix any broken links and redirect chains. These add extra loading steps.
10. Mobile Friendly
Most people use their phones to browse the internet and often have slower connections. Test your site on mobile, use a responsive design and avoid using popups that will block content. Google will look at your mobile site so it’s important to make sure it’s performing well.
Speed Checklist
Test using PageSpeed Insights and take note of your starting point.
Compress and resize your images.
Enable caching.
Remove any unused plugins.
Consider using a CDN.
Check your host if your server is slow.
Test again.
Common Errors
Don’t just install a speed plugin. While they can help they can’t fix large images or heavy themes.
Don’t aim for a perfect score. You don’t need to get 100. Just make sure your site is running quickly and smoothly for real users.
Don’t change too much at once. Only change one thing at a time so you know what has helped.
Don’t forget to look at real data. While lab data is useful, field data is much more important.
Final Thoughts
Having a faster site will make your visitors happier, help your pages rank better and keep people on your site. You don’t need to be a developer to make a big difference. By compressing your images, removing plugins, enabling caching and choosing a good host you’ll fix most issues.
Today, run a test. Identify the biggest issue and fix that first. Then come back and do the next one.
What is the biggest change you’ve done to speed up your site? Let us know in the comments below!
