When thinking about a website’s overall performance and functionality, what comes to mind is the speed of the pages or the loading time. Website performance depends on a number of factors, and unless you know their significance, you may struggle to achieve it.
A website that loads quickly provides its users with a good User experience (UX) and boosts its ranking in search engines like Google, Bing, and others.
Let’s consider some effective strategies to make your website or blog load faster.
-
Hosting Service
Some people think where you transfer your code files to doesn’t matter much as long as you can call the website. Users would naturally desire a very cheap hosting service that might be shared between tens of websites hosted on a server already overloaded. Consequently, the time it takes for the website and its pages to load will significantly increase.
Also, there are lots of web hosting services that help to optimize speed. Most times, these hosting companies don’t provide shared hosting services. Therefore, the worries of being on some overloaded server will not happen.
-
Large Image Files
As important as it is, we must find a way to use high-quality images while optimizing our website’s load time. Compressing the images, for example, is a useful strategy. It’s possible that lazy loading and image compression with a high-quality image compression tool will be required. Furthermore, there are numerous image optimization plugins available, all of which are capable of resolving this issue.
-
Reduce Your Redirects
Figure out how to cut down on the number of redirects that are used on your website. Every time an HTTP request is made, there is a response time associated with that request; consequently, there is a delay associated with each call. However, it is essential in specific circumstances, such as when you are transferring the files for your website to a new domain.
-
Use Cache
Caching allows some file components to be stored on the browser, allowing the site to load faster and reducing the amount of work done on the server in rendering the fully-functional page. Caching also assists in lowering the amount of memory used by the browser.
Caching reduces the amount of time it takes the server to render the first byte of data, which speeds up loading time.
Caching your websites can be accomplished in a variety of ways. One simple method is to go through the server; this operation is handled by the host server.
-
Browser Cache
Understanding how browser cache works is another very important step to increasing website speed. The research was done on enostech.com, and the results provided more insight into the operation of storage systems, which is similar to the local storage of your browser. Please take note that some of your website components have been saved to this local storage of your browser.
You can use this to your advantage to decrease the amount of time it takes for your webpage to load. Your web browser likely stores various components, such as images, stylesheets, and JavaScript files; as a result, the server does not need to repeatedly send those files.
There are plugins available for those who use WordPress as their content management system (CMS) that are powerful enough to manage these types of situations.
-
Use the Asynchronous Method on Your Javascript and CSS Components
JavaScript and CSS are two of the most important components of a website. These programming languages have the option of loading synchronously or asynchronously.
The synchronous method is slightly slower because the component files are loaded one at a time in the order listed on your website. Whenever the browser is about to execute or load a script, other loading elements are suspended until the scripts are fully executed and loaded.
The asynchronous method, on the other hand, loads multiple file components at the same time, resulting in a faster loading time. To accomplish this, you must disable render-blocking services.
If you use WordPress, there are several Autoptimize JavaScript plugins that can help you with this.
-
Cleaner Code
Cleaner code, which is more effective in writing your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript codes, can help improve your website’s functionality and reduce loading time. A cleaner code comprises fewer comments, non-deprecated language statements, newer methods, and the use of classes and functions.
These methods for writing cleaner and more effective code can reduce file size, making it much easier to combine and thus reducing the time it takes to load each component file in the webpage.
There are plugins available for WordPress users that can handle this as well.
-
Take Advantage of Content Delivery Network (CDN)
A content delivery network (CDN) is a great tool to use and implement. It can be used in a variety of ways. It can improve performance by reducing the time it takes for browsers to send a request to your hosting service provider. This is accomplished by sending copies of your site to each user from the nearest servers.
A CDN link can be placed in the header of your file to supply its contents when they are due without you having to upload your own file to your hosting server, resulting in a smaller total file size and a faster loading experience. For developers, using Image CDN can help with the quick delivery of images for upload. There is a CDN list to choose from, and you can activate it directly from your CPanel dashboard.
-
Delete Unwanted Plugins
Too many plugins are unnecessary; only use the ones that are useful and functional. Plugins that are not maintained, and thus are outdated, can cause issues for the website, ranging from compatibility issues to a complete website crash.
As a result, it makes sense to limit the number of plugins installed on a WordPress site. One quick way to do this is to identify the plugins that are no longer in use, disable them, and then delete them.
It is also necessary to go over the plugins that have been installed on the site and determine how important each one is. Some plugins may perform two to three functions, while others that are no longer functional should be replaced or removed.
Additionally, some plugins may have difficulty loading, increasing the loading time; such plugins should be removed.
How To Begin The Deactivation Process
Turn off all plugins, then re-enable them one by one. When you enable a plugin, you should notice a difference in the loading speed. You can use a Page Speed tool to determine the loading speed with high accuracy.
Also, keep in mind that a fast-loading web page improves its SEO and overall user experience (UX).
-
Requests for HTTP
A Yahoo analysis states that approximately eighty percent of the webpage loading time is dedicated to downloading various site components such as images, JavaScript, and CSS.
An HTTP request is sent for each component file to load; thus, the more components there are, the longer the loading time.
To solve this problem, you must first determine the number of HTTP requests made by your website. You can use Google Chrome as a browser. It has a developer tool for checking the number of HTTP requests.
To do this, right-click on the desired page, then click “inspect”, then click on “Network”.
-
Determining the Number of HTTP Requests with the Developer Tool
The column with the title “NAME” reveals the entire files on your website. The column titled “SIZE” reveals every file’s size. Then the column titled “TIME” reveals the time it took to load each file.
At the bottom of the page on the left, you will find the overall sum of the number of HTTP Requests the site made.
Now you see which files take the most time to load, especially image files. To reduce the number of HTTP requests, remove necessary images, and use high-quality compressed images for the ones that are relevant.
-
Server Response Time
A DNS is a server that maintains a database of IP addresses along with the corresponding hostnames. If you put a URL into the browser, a DNS server converts it into the IP that clarifies its online location. The time it takes for your DNS lookup to complete is a major factor in how quickly your page loads. The time it takes your DNS server to look up addresses is very important. A DNS lookup is simply a method of locating a specific DNS record.
If your DNS is slow, you will notice an increase in the time it takes for your webpage to be rendered. You should consider switching to a better DNS provider to improve the speed.
A faster website or blog is not something that can just happen by chance; rather, there are some deliberate steps that need to be taken, of which we have explained the majority of the important ones. The website’s performance in general, as well as its ranking in search engines, is relatively dependent on this performance, hence it should be considered a priority.
