Inconsistent website loading times were a constant frustration for us. Some pages blazed to life instantly, while others dragged their feet for what felt like hours. Back then, as a new member of the #Product team, terms like "#pageloadtime" didn't mean much. But I quickly learned its profound impact on both user experience and #SEO.
Now, let's delve deeper into the key #metrics that affect website speed and how we can optimize them!
- Largest Contentful Paint (#LCP): Measures how long it takes for the largest content element to load. Aim for under 2.5 seconds.
- First Input Delay (FID): Measures how responsive the page feels to user interactions. Aim for under 100 milliseconds.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (#CLS): Measures how much unexpected layout shifts occur during page loading. Aim for a CLS of 0.1 or less.
- Time to Interactive (TTI): Measures how long it takes the page to become fully interactive. Aim for under 3 seconds.
- LCP: Same as above.
- FID: Same as above.
- First Contentful Paint (FCP): Measures how long it takes for the first piece of content to appear. Aim for under 1.8 seconds.
- Image optimization: Tracks the percentage of images that can be further optimized for smaller file sizes without losing quality.
- Critical rendering path: Identifies resources that are critical for initial page rendering and suggests improvements.
- JavaScript execution: Helps identify and reduce unnecessary JavaScript execution.
- Browser caching: Checks if your browser can cache resources for faster loading on subsequent visits.
Why are Page Speed metrics important?
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Google considers page speed as a ranking factor. Faster websites tend to rank higher in search results.
- #Userexperience: Users are more likely to abandon slow websites, leading to lost conversions and lower engagement.
- Accessibility: Faster websites are more accessible to users with slower internet connections or disabilities.
There are ways to Optimize your website for Page Speed:
- Optimize images: Resize, compress, and use efficient image formats (e.g., WebP).
- Minify and combine resources: Reduce the size of CSS, JavaScript, and HTML files.
- Leverage browser caching: Use caching mechanisms to store resources locally on user devices.
- Reduce render-blocking resources: Optimize critical resources to load first and render the page.
- Enable compression: Use Gzip or Brotli compression to reduce file size.
- Consider a Content Delivery Network (CDN): Serve static content from geographically distributed servers for faster loading times.
Improving your website's Page Speed is an ongoing process. Regularly monitor your metrics and implement new optimization techniques to keep your website running at its best.
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