How Page Speed Affects SEO & 14 Ways to Improve Page Load Time
What Is Google PageSpeed Insights?
Google PageSpeed Insights is a tool that Google provides to help webmasters and site owners improve the performance of their websites. The tool gives detailed information about speed and best practices, from both a technical and user experience perspective.
The focus of PageSpeed Insights is on page speed, which can have a significant impact on SEO rankings and user experience. As such, it’s important for website owners to make sure their pages are as fast as possible. The tool can help identify issues that need to be fixed in order to improve performance.
Does Page Speed Affect SEO? Is 100/100 Insights Score Essential?
There is a lot of debate on whether or not page speed affects SEO. Google has made it clear that they value user experience and site speed is one factor that contributes to this. However, there are many contradicting reports on how much of an impact page speed actually has on rankings.
At Google, the users always come first. This means that they rank sites based on how well they provide a good user experience. A slow website will likely have a high bounce rate and reduced dwell time, which are both factors that contribute to bad user experience. As a result, it’s in your best interest to make sure your website loads quickly for your visitors.
While it’s still unclear if page speed is a direct ranking factor, improving your score in PageSpeed Insights can only help you rank better in search engine results pages (SERPs). In fact, even if your score is low but you see significant improvements, you’re likely to see an increase in organic traffic as well.
PageSpeed Insights Metrics
Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool is a popular resource for testing website speed. It offers both a desktop and mobile test, as well as an evaluation of how well your website scores on a number of metrics. One such metric is “DCL” or “dynamic content loading.” This measures how quickly the initial viewport is filled with visible content after the page has loaded. A high score in this category indicates that most of the content on your page loads simultaneously, providing a better user experience.
Another metric used by PageSpeed Insights is “FCP” or “full-page compression.” This measures the percentage of bytes saved from compressing all elements on the page. A high score in this category means that Google can serve your pages faster because there is less data to transfer.
PageSpeed Insight also checks other aspects of your website performance, such as rendering time, time to interactive, and start render time. You can use these metrics to improve your website speed and ultimately rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs).
How Is the PageSpeed Insights Score Calculated?
Google has been using the PageSpeed Insights score for a while now to help webmasters improve their website speed. The score is calculated by looking at a number of performance metrics and giving each one a weight. The total score is then based on the seconds it takes for each metric to be achieved.
While all of the metrics are important, Time to Interactivity and Speed Index are two of the most important ones when it comes to calculating the initial score. These two factors affect how quickly users can start interacting with your website. If nothing displays on screen, they’re more likely to leave your website altogether.
The PageSpeed Insights score isn’t just based on First Contentful Paint (FCP). In fact, FCP only has a small impact on the overall score. The first meaningful paint (FMP) affects the score more because if there’s no content on screen, users are going to leave your website pretty quickly.
Key Points in Improving your PageSpeed Insights Score
When it comes to improving your website’s PageSpeed Insights Score, there are a few key things you should keep in mind. First and foremost, always make sure you have a backup of your website before doing any changes! This is important not only for the sake of preserving your data, but also because some of the changes you make may not work as intended and could actually end up slowing down your site.
Another thing to keep in mind when trying to improve your score is that it’s best to focus on one page at a time. Checking multiple pages simultaneously can be overwhelming and make it difficult to determine which issues need attention first. By taking things one step at a time, you can more easily identify and address any problems that may be causing your page load time to suffer.
Finally, the PageSpeed Insights Score is available via the https://pagespeed.web.dev/ . This handy tool allows you to quickly see how well (or poorly) your website is performing according to Google’s guidelines–and what steps you can take to improve its speed.
The Claim: Page Speed Is A Ranking Factor
There are a lot of discussions about page speed and its effects on SEO. Some people say that it’s a ranking factor, while others claim that it isn’t. So what’s the truth?
Well, Google has never come out and said explicitly that page speed is a ranking factor. However, they have made some statements which suggest that it is. For example, in 2010, Google’s Matt Cutts said: “We do use [page load time] as one of the signals to rank pages.”
More recently, in 2016, Google’s Gary Illyes said: “It definitely matters… We use site speed as one of the signals.”
So although Google hasn’t confirmed it outright, there is evidence to suggest that they use page speed as a ranking factor.
The Evidence For Page Speed As A Ranking Factor
Google has been ranking pages based on speed since 2010. In that time, they’ve made a few changes to how speed is used as a ranking factor. Originally, the signal was desktop-only, but it was later expanded to mobile searches in 2018.
At first, Google only looked at the page’s technical performance. Things like download time and page size were taken into account when determining where a website should rank. However, over time they realized that user experience is just as important as technical performance. So in 2018, they announced that page speed would also be used as a ranking factor for mobile searches .
This change means that not only do you have to worry about optimizing your site for desktop users, but you also need to make sure it’s fast enough for mobile users! And if you’re not sure where to start, don’t worry – we’ve got you covered.
Page Speed As A Ranking Factor: Our Verdict
Page speed is definitely a ranking factor for Google. The search engine has confirmed this time and again, and the importance of page speed is only increasing. However, what’s less clear is how much weight it carries in comparison to other factors like relevance or authority.
What we do know is that speed isn’t as important as quality content. You can have the fastest website in the world, but if your content doesn’t meet user needs or interests, you won’t rank high in search results. Don’t focus all your efforts on making your website lightning fast at the expense of great content–that’s not going to help you achieve better SEO results.
At the same time, don’t neglect page speed altogether; it’s still an important consideration for any site looking to rank well in Google search results pages (SERPs). As page speeds continue to increase in importance, make sure you’re doing everything possible to optimize yours. That may mean tweaking images sizes, reducing HTTP requests, caching static files, and using a CDN service
Ways to Diagnose Page Speed
There are many ways to diagnose page speed. One way is to use Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool. This will give you a report on how well your page performs and what you can do to improve it.
The PageSpeed Insights tool will help you identify areas of improvement on your website so that you can make changes that will improve the overall performance. It provides specific recommendations for images, CSS and JavaScript files, as well as general suggestions for making your page faster.
You can also use other tools like GTMetrix or PingdomTools to get a more in-depth look at your website’s performance and find additional areas for improvement. Each of these tools offers different insights into how you can improve the speed of your website.
It’s important to note that the results of these tests may vary depending on a number of factors, including the type of device being used and its connection speed. So it’s always best to run a test on your own website to get accurate results.
How to Improve Page Speed
Page speed is an important factor that affects SEO. As Google continues to emphasize the importance of page speed, it’s crucial to make sure your website loads quickly for visitors. Luckily, there are many ways to improve page speed and we’ve outlined some of them below.
Code Optimization: One of the best ways to improve page speed is through code optimization. This means cleaning up your codebase so that files are smaller and load more quickly. Be sure to reference your test results so you know which areas need the most attention.
Remove Unnecessary Characters: Another way to improve page speed is by removing unnecessary characters, commas, spaces, and other items that slow down loading times. You can do this manually or use compression software to reduce file sizes when needed.
Smaller Images: In the long term, smaller images will help improve page speed as they take less time to download. You can use compression software or resize images before uploading them to your site.
Learn More: If you want to learn more about how to improve page speed, be sure not miss our blog post on the subject!
You won’t have a second chance for that first impression: Everything starts with speed
When someone visits your website for the first time, you have one chance to make a good impression. If it takes too long for your site to load, they’ll leave–and they may never come back.
Speed is essential for a good user experience and it’s also important from a business perspective. A slow loading website will result in fewer visitors/clients/consumers, which could lead to lost sales. In fact, studies show that a delay of just one second can cause conversions to drop sharply.
It’s no wonder why site speed is such an important factor! The average mobile website takes over 15 seconds to load and people expect them to load in less than 3 seconds before leaving altogether. So any improvement here can pay off quickly.
But site speed isn’t only important from a consumer standpoint–it’s also crucial from an SEO perspective. Search engines are increasingly viewing site performance as a ranking factor, so it’s important to make sure your website loads quickly if you want to rank high in search results.
Fortunately, there are many ways you can improve page load time on your website. Check out our list of 14 tips below:
1) Optimize images
2) Minimize HTTP requests
3) Use a content delivery network
4) Optimize your code
5) Reduce server response time
6) Enable compression
7) Eliminate render-blocking JavaScript and CSS
8) Load scripts asynchronously
9) Optimize caching
10) Minimize redirects
11) Avoid plugins and widgets that slow down your site
12) Prioritize above the fold content
13) Use a fast web host
14) Test, test, test!
5 Tips to Improve Website Page Speed
There are many things you can do to help improve your page speed. Here are a few tips:
1) Use a CDN to make sure your files are always close by.
2) Leverage browser caching for infrequently changing files to reduce load time.
3) Enable Gzip compression on your server and compress images to further decrease load time
4) Implement AMP, a Google tool that removes stuff from pages that visitors don’t need.
5) Avoid redirects and lazy load images further down the page than the first screenful.