Pagespeed for WordPress websites

I use GTMetrix (https://gtmetrix.com/) and Google PageSpeed Insights (https://pagespeed.web.dev/) to measure my website speed. Right now, this blog is scoring 50 on performance, and my business portfolio is scoring 60—not the best numbers, I know. I used to chase those numbers so much that I lost sleep over it.

You can use those metrics to analyze and enhance your website, find and troubleshoot issues that exist on your site, but the best way to test is to check for real-life user experience. As long as the website loads in under 2 seconds, it’s fine. This is not an excuse, though; I’m still on the journey to find ways to speed up my website and increase my performance score as much as possible.

Here are some ways I’ve found that can really affect your website performance and page speed:

Hosting Server: Choose the right hosting server and location—this is the most important element affecting your website. In my case, depending on where your server delivers your website content to your visitor’s location can highly impact loading speed. You can use Cloudflare (https://www.cloudflare.com/) as a CDN to leverage multiple caching servers that can deliver your content quickly. I chose Cloudways (https://www.cloudways.com/) as my hosting server of choice due to their great customer support. I’ve also heard great things about RunCloud (https://runcloud.io/).
Page Builder: If you’re using WordPress and are a web designer, you most probably use a page builder. You should research the one that best fits your needs, learn the basics of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and inspect the elements your page builder outputs to the actual website—the less bloat, the better for page speed as well as SEO. I chose BricksBuilder (https://bricksbuilder.io/) as it has the cleanest code output I’ve seen so far. Elementor (https://elementor.com/) is a big name in the industry, and they keep making improvements, so I’ll keep an eye out for them as well.
Plugins: Use as few plugins as possible—only what you need. You should have at least one caching plugin for your website. I use Breeze (part of Cloudways) as my caching plugin; you can also check out WP Fastest Cache (https://www.wpfastestcache.com/) and LiteSpeed Cache (https://wordpress.org/plugins/litespeed-cache/) (especially if you’re using a LiteSpeed server). You can use Perfmatters (https://perfmatters.io/) for extra optimization. Avoid fake performance plugins like 10web (https://10web.io/) or NitroPack (https://nitropack.io/) that might trick page speed measuring tools into giving you a high score while your website remains slow in reality.

What else do you do to increase your website performance and page speed? I’d love to learn more—feel free to shoot me an email at hello@binhnguyen.me.

Here are some ways I’ve found that can really affect your website performance and page speed:

Hosting Server: Choose the right hosting server and location—this is the most important element affecting your website. In my case, depending on where your server delivers your website content to your visitor’s location can highly impact loading speed. You can use Cloudflare (https://www.cloudflare.com/) as a CDN to leverage multiple caching servers that can deliver your content quickly. I chose Cloudways (https://www.cloudways.com/) as my hosting server of choice due to their great customer support. I’ve also heard great things about RunCloud (https://runcloud.io/).
Page Builder: If you’re using WordPress and are a web designer, you most probably use a page builder. You should research the one that best fits your needs, learn the basics of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and inspect the elements your page builder outputs to the actual website—the less bloat, the better for page speed as well as SEO. I chose BricksBuilder (https://bricksbuilder.io/) as it has the cleanest code output I’ve seen so far. Elementor (https://elementor.com/) is a big name in the industry, and they keep making improvements, so I’ll keep an eye out for them as well.
Plugins: Use as few plugins as possible—only what you need. You should have at least one caching plugin for your website. I use Breeze (part of Cloudways) as my caching plugin; you can also check out WP Fastest Cache (https://www.wpfastestcache.com/) and LiteSpeed Cache (https://wordpress.org/plugins/litespeed-cache/) (especially if you’re using a LiteSpeed server). You can use Perfmatters (https://perfmatters.io/) for extra optimization. Avoid fake performance plugins like 10web (https://10web.io/) or NitroPack (https://nitropack.io/) that might trick page speed measuring tools into giving you a high score while your website remains slow in reality.

What else do you do to increase your website performance and page speed? I’d love to learn more—feel free to shoot me an email at hello@binhnguyen.me.

Here are some ways I’ve found that can really affect your website performance and page speed:

Hosting Server: Choose the right hosting server and location—this is the most important element affecting your website. In my case, depending on where your server delivers your website content to your visitor’s location can highly impact loading speed. You can use Cloudflare (https://www.cloudflare.com/) as a CDN to leverage multiple caching servers that can deliver your content quickly. I chose Cloudways (https://www.cloudways.com/) as my hosting server of choice due to their great customer support. I’ve also heard great things about RunCloud (https://runcloud.io/).
Page Builder: If you’re using WordPress and are a web designer, you most probably use a page builder. You should research the one that best fits your needs, learn the basics of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and inspect the elements your page builder outputs to the actual website—the less bloat, the better for page speed as well as SEO. I chose BricksBuilder (https://bricksbuilder.io/) as it has the cleanest code output I’ve seen so far. Elementor (https://elementor.com/) is a big name in the industry, and they keep making improvements, so I’ll keep an eye out for them as well.
Plugins: Use as few plugins as possible—only what you need. You should have at least one caching plugin for your website. I use Breeze (part of Cloudways) as my caching plugin; you can also check out WP Fastest Cache (https://www.wpfastestcache.com/) and LiteSpeed Cache (https://wordpress.org/plugins/litespeed-cache/) (especially if you’re using a LiteSpeed server). You can use Perfmatters (https://perfmatters.io/) for extra optimization. Avoid fake performance plugins like 10web (https://10web.io/) or NitroPack (https://nitropack.io/) that might trick page speed measuring tools into giving you a high score while your website remains slow in reality.

What else do you do to increase your website performance and page speed? I’d love to learn more—feel free to shoot me an email at hello@binhnguyen.me.

binh

design & dev • build in public, thoughts

design & dev • build in public

design & dev • technology