Here’s some interesting stats about time impact of slow web pages:
Microsoft Found
“A two second delay in response time for Bing, reduced user satisfaction by 3.8%, resulted in 4.3% less revenue per user.”
A Report By LoadStorm Confirms
One second delay in your website load time means 7% less conversions, 11% fewer page views and 16% decrease in customer satisfaction.
& Google counts poor performance against you.
Anyone Can Make WordPress Faster
One of the more frustrating discoveries is there are mostly one size fits or outdated tips on the web for WordPress. Many of the current enhancements can be made by just about anyone with access to the WordPress admin. Word of caution, backup before doing any of them.
What Makes WordPress Slow?
The company that created WordPress – Automattic can’t just “make” WordPress faster. WordPress has become the multi-tool of choice, it’s built to apply to just about anyone. It works good out of the box for most folks. But it can be customized to run much faster.
What we do with our WordPress site & the hosting environment matters. If we took a multitool and left it in the rain to rust, it won’t work it’s best. But stored, oiled and sharpened it’s useful – so is WordPress.
Speaking of environment, this video by Automattic engineer Iliya Polihronov describes a large scale server setup. The same used by WordPress.com for hosting. This proves it’s takes more than the default WordPress install to make WordPress faster.
You could essentially set up the same exact environment using our Linux cPanel VPS servers with some customization.
Top 3 WordPress Performance KILLERS
- Executing PHP code
Executing PHP code means the web-server (or place your WordPress site is hosted) has extra work to do every time a page loads. Some of the time it’s needless. For example – some huge gains can be seen replacing php with static HTML or using a caching plugin. - Database calls
Database calls are like making a phone call. It requires picking up the phone, dialing, talking etc. The fewer outbound “calls” to the database means less time it takes to fully load a page. - Downloads
Downloads means anything that a visitors browser needs to make the page complete. Like images, javascript, embedded elements, css and so on.
How To Make WordPress 100x Faster
There’s 10 ways you can immediately make WordPress faster, much faster! There are probably more, but we believe these are the best. We also added some “Advanced” (tips 11-14) suggestions for speed and workflow.
Get Caching & CDN ASAP. The most painless way is sign-up for CloudFlare. Utilize their CDN and caching to offload the work of creating dynamic pages.
Optimize the database. This also includes deleting spam comments and remove trackbacks (also spam, read here), set a scheduled task to do this for you every so often. The WP Optimize Plugin can do this.
Install WP Super Cache. Once you’ve activated it, you can enable CDN support with MaxCDN, CloudFlare and others.
Eliminate or Replace Slow Plugins. Use the P3-Profiler to analyze plugin performance.
Optimize images. Use EWWW Image Optimizer. For Mac, also try ImageOptim.
Compress & Browser Cache. Use Far Future Expiry. Manual steps: browser caching guide & .htaccess tweaks.
Control & Remove Revisions. Use Revision Control.
Stop Hotlinking. Use CloudFlare option or edit .htaccess.
Minify Scripts. Use Better WordPress Minify.
Keep WordPress Updated. Updates are now automated, but always backup first.
[Advanced] Use Memcached with Batcache. Install Memcached + Batcache.
[Advanced] Restructure Theme. Replace PHP with HTML where possible and move scripts to footer.
[Advanced] Use GIT. Develop a workflow. Use Github.
[Advanced] Monitor for Errors. Use Airbrake or check logs manually.
What else?
We hope this gets you excited about the possibilities increasing the speed of your WordPress site. Making wise choices about plugins, themes and where you host your WordPress, either on VPS or shared can have an impact.
We’re always exploring ways to make Hostek cPanel VPS and Windows VPS the best choices for WordPress Hosting. If you have questions about these tips, or want hands on help with Hosting questions, talk to support, or consult free with a VPS expert.
We’re glad to help!