People love websites that respond quickly. They do not have the time to wait for your website to load. To get the best audience, your WordPress should load on time. To make sure that this happens, you will need the option to speed up your WordPress website. Here are 10 Ways to Speed Up WordPress website without much effort.
You may ask the reason why page speed matters. Well, it matters if you want your website to be ranked at the top of the SEO. Also, people have a concise attention span. If your website does not load on time, they will switch to the next website.
In this article, you will get the best ways to make your WordPress site speedy. Read on to find out how to do so!
First, you should know the options you can consider to understand the speed of your website.
GTmetrix
One of the options you can consider is GTmetrix. This is a free tool that will help you to ace the performance of your WordPress website. All you need to do is go to the GTmetrix website and enter the URL of your website. With the free version, you can set the test server region and browser settings. You might want to take up the paid version if you want more control.
PageSpeed Insights
PageSpeed Insights is also a free tool that Google provides. Here, you need to enter the URL in the box that will be there on the top of the screen.
WebPageTest
You can also use WebPageTest to test how fast your website is.
There are tools like UpTrends and Dareboost that provide a chance for a free website speed test. You can learn how to speed up your WordPress website with the tips and tricks they provide as well.
Now that you know a few options to help you, let us move on to the 10 important things you should consider to speed up the process.
Steps To Consider To Make Your Website Faster Government Want To Distract The Audience From
Pick a fast web host
This is the first thing you should do! The faster the web host is, the quicker your website will load. You will have to choose the type of host very wisely. You will have to choose between what gives you better performance and which one is cost-effective. You might want to spend some part of your time to get the perfect host for your website. This is one of the contributing factors to speed up your WordPress website. You can learn how to choose a web hosting server by reading this article.
A lightweight and flexible theme is recommended
Apart from hosting, you need to choose a sensible theme as well. The theme also is a basis for the speed of your website to load.
You may want your website to look astounding and attractive. However, this will not matter if there is nobody visiting your site! Select a theme with fewer features. You can develop it once you gain a high audience. This will make viewers visit your website more frequently. TemplateToaster and NicePage are two WordPress theme builders you can choose from. You can read more about them here.
Choose the plugins that are right for you to get the best speed for your WordPress website
You should note that plugins are required for your WordPress website to function better. But, this does not mean that you install all of the plugins that exist under the sun. Choose the plugins that will help you. Only install those plugins that you are going to use. The more the plugins, the slower the website will be.
Just because you like a plugin, does not mean you install it. You should research it a little. Make sure that it does not conflict with the other plugins. Here are some plugins that can help you to speed up WordPress quickly.
Optimize your WordPress database to speed up WordPress Search
There is a database where all of your WordPress data is stored. This how people view the data on your website. As soon as people post comments, the database is updated automatically. As and when your site receives inputs, the database size will increase. This increase in size will lead to the site getting slow. So, you need to regularly keep a track of the information that is getting outdated. You might want to also remove any spam comments. This is extremely vital to speed up your WordPress website. One way is also to optimize the images of your website. This way, you can easily speed up WordPress as well. Some websites like ShortPixel, Smush, and TinyPNG are few image optimization tools that can help to speed up WordPress page load time.
Also Read: OptinMonster Alternatives
Use a CDN to deliver resources
A Contact Delivery Network (CDN) is a group of servers that are placed in a strategic manner throughout the world. A typical WordPress site sometimes weighs about 2.5 MB. So, if you store this on a CDN server, a visitor from any part of the globe can potentially load them from a server nearest to them. This will bring down the load time of the web page.
Make sure that your images are ready for the web so that you speed up your WordPress website
There are a few things you should keep in mind when you are uploading an image. Check if the size of the image is not too big. Also, look at the image quality too. Try not to take up some random picture that does not belong to you. There will be copyright issues too.
Manage the static files efficiently
You must take care that you manage the static files properly. So, you should use simple scripts to reduce the size of the site again. Filter out comments that are unnecessary. You can also use GZIP compression to further compress your resources.
Optimize HTTP requests
You should also ensure that the HTTP requests are minimized. You can do this by combining similar files. Also, you can reduce the number of DNS lookups.
There is also an option for you to minimize the number of redirects for static resources.
Enable caching in WordPress
We all know what cache files are. Caching will allow you to store a part of the page temporarily. When you are choosing a cache plugin, you will be able to set up and provide the performance.
Update WordPress and PHP to speed up your WordPress website
One thing you should do regularly is to update WordPress and PHP. This is because they undergo a lot of changes and bug fixes. You might want to be free of any bugs. Those are the main reasons why your site might slow down.
Conclusion
You have to keep these ten tips in mind when starting your own website. Remember, the speed of your website will determine your success.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1. Are There Apps To Speed Up WordPress Website?
Web performance is an important factor for any successful WordPress website. Fortunately, there are a variety of free and premium plugins available that can help speed up WordPress webiste. WP Rocket is a premium plugin that provides numerous features to minimize loading times and give it an extra boost.
WP Fastest Cache is another plugin offering comprehensive cache options to maximize page speed, while LiteSpeed Cache takes the idea of caching a step further with API integration and a CDN setup. In addition, you can use WP-Optimize to optimize database tables, W3 Total Cache for browser, server and object caching,WP Super Cache which offers two levels of caching or Hummingbird to minify your assets. With these plugins, you’ll be able to quickly unlock the full potential of your WordPress site, and speed up your WordPress website!
Q2. Is it recommended to use a lightweight WordPress theme for better website speed?
Yes, using a lightweight WordPress theme is generally recommended for improving website speed. Lightweight themes have minimal code, fewer features, and focus on performance optimization. They don’t burden your website with unnecessary functionalities, resulting in faster loading times. Choosing a well-coded, lightweight theme can contribute significantly to your WordPress website’s speed and overall performance.
Q3.How can minimizing CSS and JavaScript files help in speeding up a WordPress website?
Minifying CSS and JavaScript files involves removing unnecessary characters, such as spaces, line breaks, and comments, from the code. This process reduces the file size of these files, resulting in faster downloads and parsing by the user’s browser. Plugins like Autoptimize can automatically minify CSS and JavaScript files in WordPress, making it easier to implement this optimization technique.
Q4.What is a good speed for a website?
If you want a quick answer, the Google recommended page load time is under two seconds: “Two seconds is the threshold for ecommerce website acceptability. At Google, we aim for under a half-second.”
Q5.Why improve website speed?
Speed plays a decisive role in how audiences perceive a brand on the web. It is human tendency to consider a faster website more reliable and professional. Inversely, a slow website is mostly annoying for users. Most users bounce immediately and prefer visiting other, faster websites to meet their requirement.
Q6.What role does a content delivery network (CDN) play in speeding up a WordPress website?
A CDN is a network of servers distributed geographically across the globe. When you use a CDN with your WordPress website, it stores copies of your static files, such as images, CSS, and JavaScript, in multiple server locations. When a user requests your website, the CDN delivers the files from the server closest to the user’s location. This reduces the distance the data needs to travel and improves the overall loading speed of your website.