If you have a WordPress site, then you know how important it is to make sure that it loads quickly.
A slow-loading website can frustrate your visitors and cause them to leave before they even have a chance to see what you have to offer and can also hurt your SEO rankings.
In this comprehensive guide, I will show you how to speed up your WordPress site using some simple techniques.
So without wasting time let’s get started.
How to find out why your site is slow?
The first step is to find out why your WordPress site is loading slowly in the first place.
There are a few different ways to do this:
– Use a speed testing tool like Pingdom or GTmetrix. These tools will give you a detailed report of how long each element on your page takes to load.
– Check your server response time. This can be done using a tool like WebPageTest. Simply enter your URL and select “First View” and then “Repeat View”.
– Enable debugging in WordPress. This will give you information about what is causing your website to load slowly.
Common Reasons that slows down your site
Now that you know how to find out why your WordPress site is loading slowly, let’s take a look at some of the most common reasons:
– Poorly coded themes and plugins
– Unoptimized images
– Too many redirects
– External scripts such as social media widgets
-Slow hosting
-Not using cache plugins
How to Speed Up Your WordPress Site
Now that we’ve looked at some of the common reasons why WordPress sites load slowly, let’s take a look at how to speed them up.
Image Optimization
One of the easiest ways to speed up your WordPress site is to optimize your images.
Images are often the largest files on a page and can take a long time to load, especially if they’re not compressed.
When your site is new this seems like a big problem but with time as your site grows, it starts affecting the speed of your WordPress site.
There are a few different ways to optimize your images:
– Use an image compression plugin like WP Smush or Imagify. These plugins will automatically compress your images when you upload them to WordPress.
– Resize your images before you upload them. You can do this using an image editor like Photoshop or GIMP.
– Use a content delivery network (CDN) for your images. A CDN stores copies of your images on servers around the world and serves them from the location that is closest to the visitor. This can speed up the delivery of your images.
Use HTTPS and not HTTP
One of the best ways to speed up your WordPress site is to use a secure connection (HTTPS).
When you use a secure connection, it encrypts the data that is being sent between your website and the visitor’s browser.
This can speed up the loading of your pages, as well as improve security.
You can switch from using an insecure connection (HTTPS) to a secure one (SSL) by buying an SSL certificate and installing it on your server.
If you’re not sure how to do this, your hosting company should be able to help you.
Use a Caching Plugin
Another great way to speed up your WordPress site is to use a caching plugin.
Caching plugins create a static copy of your website and services to visitors instead of dynamic content.
This can speed up the loading of your pages, as well as reduce the strain on your server.
There are a few different caching plugins to choose from, but we recommend using WP Super Cache or WPRocket.
There are some free and premium options available, so choose the one that best suits your needs.
Lite speed cache is one free plugin that I would suggest if you are just getting started.
Use a Content Delivery Network (CDN)
A content delivery network (CDN) is a network of servers that deliver content to visitors based on their location.
For example, if you have a visitor from the United States, the CDN will serve them content from a server in the United States.
This can speed up the delivery of your content, as well as reduce the strain on your server.
There are a few different CDN providers to choose from, but we recommend using Cloudflare or MaxCDN.
Both of these providers have free and paid plans available, so choose the one that best suits your needs.
Keep the number of plugins limited
One of the main reasons why WordPress sites are slow is because of poorly coded plugins.
When you install a plugin, it adds code to your website that needs to be loaded every time a page is accessed.
If you have a lot of plugins installed, this can slow down your website.
We recommend only installing the plugins that you absolutely need, and uninstalling the ones that you don’t use.
You can also try using a plugin like Pippins Plugins which allows you to disable certain features of a plugin on specific pages or posts.
Use Premium Web Hosting Services
If you’re serious about speed, then you should consider using premium web hosting services.
Premium web hosts typically offer more resources and better performance than shared hosts.
Some of the best premium WordPress hosts include WP Engine, Hostinger, Bluehost, Flywheel, and Kinsta.
Update Theme and Plugins regularly
One of the best ways to speed up your WordPress site is to keep your themes and plugins up to date.
When new versions of themes and plugins are released, they often include performance improvements and bug fixes.
So by keeping your themes and plugins up to date, you can ensure that your website is running at its best.
Mobile Friendly
More and more people are using their mobile devices to access the internet, so it’s important to make sure that your WordPress site is mobile-friendly.
There are a few different ways to do this, but we recommend using a responsive theme or a plugin like WPtouch.
Both of these options will ensure that your website looks great on all devices, including smartphones and tablets.
Use video hosting for videos
If you’re using videos on your WordPress site, then you should consider using a video hosting service like YouTube or Vimeo.
Video hosting services are designed to handle the delivery of videos, so they can take some of the strain off of your server.
Plus, they usually have faster servers than most WordPress hosts, so your videos will load faster for your visitors.
Directly uploading videos on your site is a disaster in the long run so avoid it.
Updating WordPress
One of the most important things that you can do to speed up your WordPress site is to keep it up to date.
Each new version of WordPress includes performance improvements and security fixes.
So by keeping your site up to date, you can ensure that it’s running at its best.
Plus, if you’re using an outdated version of WordPress, then you’re more likely to be hacked.
So it’s really a no-brainer. Just make sure that you always update to the latest version of WordPress as soon as it’s released.
Final Thoughts
We hope this article has helped you learn how to speed up your WordPress site.
Remember, a fast website is a good website. Not only will it improve the user experience for your visitors, but it’ll also help you rank higher in search engines.
So if you’re serious about making your WordPress site load faster, then follow the tips in this article.
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