{"id":1383,"date":"2021-11-12T18:11:41","date_gmt":"2021-11-12T17:11:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.webdesign-inspiration.com\/article\/?p=1383"},"modified":"2021-11-12T18:11:41","modified_gmt":"2021-11-12T17:11:41","slug":"page-speed-statistics-you-should-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.webdesign-inspiration.com\/article\/page-speed-statistics-you-should-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Page Speed Statistics You Should Know"},"content":{"rendered":"

When you spend a lot of time writing great content, reaching out to well-known sites for guest posting opportunities, and optimizing your site content for Google searches, you can\u2019t help but feel entitled to a larger audience than the one you have now. However, as any blogger with a wide reach would tell you, site content alone doesn\u2019t attract traffic.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

More than the content you post on your <\/span>blog<\/span><\/a>, the user experience you offer to your site visitors plays a key role in generating views and keeping users on your site. If your site is too complicated to navigate, doesn\u2019t look great, or loads too slowly, it will keep people from coming back, which wastes all the time and effort you\u2019ve put into your site.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There are a lot of variables that affect site performance, and page loading speed is one of the biggest factors that could determine if your traffic soars or falls flat on its face. If you find yourself struggling to generate traffic, you might need to take a look at your website speed. Today, I\u2019ll discuss how website speed affects performance and how to track and improve it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Why Website Speed is Important<\/span><\/h2>\n

Site speed seems like a trivial thing to care about, but it plays a key role in site performance. Studies show that you lose users for every second that it takes for their browser to open your site. For example, a page that loads in just two seconds will lose just 6% of its visitors, while a five-second delay results in a <\/span>bounce rate<\/span><\/a> close to 40%:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Source: <\/span>Pingdom<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

The less time it takes for landing pages to load on your site, the more secure users feel, especially if you\u2019re using your site for ecommerce. Even the largest sites suffer from high bounce rates when they load too slowly.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

High bounce rates have repercussions that go beyond lost traffic. Because users spend very little time on your site, Google and other search engine algorithms might decide that your site isn\u2019t of very high quality and penalize it with low search rankings. This leads to lower traffic and page views and sharp reductions in revenue. Good <\/span>business acumen<\/span><\/a> dictates that you work on keeping your customers on your page longer.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

How Fast Should Your Site Load?<\/span><\/h2>\n

You might be asking yourself at this point, <\/span>How fast should my site load?<\/span><\/i> While you can find a lot of resources saying your page shouldn\u2019t take longer than 2 or 3 seconds, the number actually comes from an <\/span>article published in 2011<\/span><\/a>. Internet connection speeds, including 5G networks, have improved vastly since then. So why hasn\u2019t the bar moved for page load speeds?<\/span><\/p>\n

As it turns out, it still takes a lot of time to <\/span>fully <\/span><\/i>load a webpage. A study conducted by <\/span>Backlinko<\/span><\/a> shows that the average page loading speed is 10.3 seconds for desktop users. Because we\u2019re already used to slow-loading pages, it almost feels like a miracle when a site takes less than 10 seconds to load. Which is a pity, really – those are 10 seconds that we could\u2019ve used to do something productive.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Google itself doesn\u2019t have any hard and fast rules regarding page speed. In 2016, Google\u2019s John Mueller and Gary Illyes had conflicting views on page loading time:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

If there\u2019s anything that you can glean from the tweets above, it\u2019s that your pages need to be as fast as they can be. If your definition of \u201cfast\u201d means 3 seconds or less, it\u2019s an admirable – but challenging – target. It will also depend on where the bulk of your traffic comes from, as we\u2019ll see in the next section.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Mobile vs Desktop Performance<\/span><\/h2>\n

More than half of all web traffic comes from mobile devices. Because a majority of site visits come from mobile, I won\u2019t blame you if you expect <\/span>mobile page<\/span><\/a> speeds to be higher. Unfortunately, this isn\u2019t the case:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Source: <\/span>Backlinko<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Why do mobile devices take longer to load pages compared to desktops? Processing power is one of the key factors. Even if smartphone manufacturers claim that their processors are now more powerful than desktop CPUs, they are constrained by two factors: heat and battery life.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Theoretically, a smartphone processor can do everything a desktop CPU can do, but it will literally burn a hole through your pocket. It will also drain the battery a lot quicker. In contrast, laptops and desktops have larger battery capacities and are often plugged into the socket, so they can use as much power as they need. In addition, desktop devices have built-in fans that dissipate the heat produced by processing data.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The type of browser is also a factor in determining page speed. Google Chrome for mobile loads pages differently from Google Chrome for Windows 10. Mobile browsers work best when they load pages with fewer requests even if they\u2019re bigger, while desktop browsers excel at loading pages with more, smaller requests. It just happens that most pages that aren\u2019t optimized for mobile fall into the latter category.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What Factors Affect Load Time<\/span><\/h2>\n

Aside from the type of device and browser being used, there are a few other factors that affect page load time:<\/span><\/p>\n

Connection speed<\/span><\/h3>\n

The type of internet connection you\u2019re using will directly affect page load speed. For instance, a fiber connection can offer up to 250 Mbps, cable internet could give you up to 100 Mbps, and DSL can go up to 15 Mbps. In contrast, 3G or 4G cellular connections tend to fluctuate depending on the cell coverage in your area.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Traffic volume<\/span><\/h3>\n

Many sites have a set bandwidth per month – that is, the amount of data it can send and receive. More traffic means more volume, but it also means your site might use up its allocated bandwidth a lot faster. You need to be ready to adjust your bandwidth if you\u2019re anticipating more traffic than usual, which could happen if you\u2019ve been <\/span>guest posting a lot<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Server\/hosting<\/span><\/h3>\n

Your web hosting service provider will have an impact on your site loading speed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Most small sites use what is called shared hosting, in which one server hosts more than one site. While this drives costs down, it could also result in longer page load time, especially if the other sites on the server use more system resources. If you believe you need more system resources, you could look into virtual private servers, which combines the cost savings of shared hosting and the convenience of exclusive control over server resources.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Once your site grows in reach, you could also consider using a content delivery network. This consists of a network of servers that host your site content and is updated in real time. When a user tries to access your site, their device will load your site from the server closest to their location, which reduces load time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Plugins<\/span><\/h3>\n

If your site runs on WordPress, plugins are quite useful in adding functionality to it. However, they could also have a negative effect on your page loading time, especially they aren\u2019t set up properly in the WordPress database.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Whenever a user visits your website, WordPress connects to the database, turns on the core WordPress software, then loads any active plugins. For instance, if your site uses a WooCommerce plugin, WordPress loads the plugin, processes the code on the host server, then sends the page to the browser.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

All this happens in a matter of seconds. However, if a plugin is not configured correctly, it affects page load speed. While it isn\u2019t true that too many plugins can slow down your site, too many improperly coded plugins degrade site performance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

File sizes and types<\/span><\/h3>\n

The larger your file sizes are, the longer it will take your browser to load the page. This applies to both media and HTML. Some file types take more space than others. For example, a PNG file, which is a lossless image file format, is larger than a JPEG file of near-identical quality. MOV videos are also larger than MP4 videos of the same length.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Page Speed Statistics: How to Measure Performance<\/span><\/h2>\n

Measuring page performance isn\u2019t comparable to measuring your car\u2019s performance. While you can see your car\u2019s speed, fuel level, revolutions per minute, and engine temperature on your car dashboard, you can\u2019t do the same for your site. However, you could figuratively look under the hood of your site and get a closer look at how it\u2019s performing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Google\u2019s PageSpeed Insights offers you a way to do just that. It lets you examine a number of real-world metrics that track page speed at different stages of the loading process. It also displays an optimization score that gives you an idea of how you can improve site performance. We\u2019ll discuss a few of these metrics below:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n