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Five Ways to Speed Up Page Response Times

sixrevisions.com — It’s important for your website to load as fast as possible; users want to see your web pages quickly and if you can’t give them that - then they’ll go somewhere else. In this article, you’ll find a discussion on five simple and effective techniques for speeding up your web pages.

Who dugg this? Made popular May 29, 2009

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  • JonnyCasino, on 05/28/2009, -1/+14I'm glad you recommended putting Stylesheets at the top and Scripts at the bottom. Such a simple thing to execute, yet so effective. One thing I would emphasize and make Avoiding CSS Expressions a number on this list [right now embedded in the list of items in #1].

    If you must set your style property dynamically throughout the page life [personally I would avoid it all together], then try using event handlers instead of CSS expressions as an alternative approach.
  • qiaohua, on 05/28/2009, -1/+10quit lookin at all those tgps
  • 99Casimir, on 05/29/2009, -2/+7I have to say that I love Safari Web Inspector as it shows how long it takes for each part of the page takes to download and the latency for each part.
  • 99Casimir, on 05/29/2009, -0/+46.134 seconds
  • tbranham, on 05/29/2009, -0/+33.9 seconds with NoScript enabled.
    4.2 seconds with NoScript disabled (and a flushed cache).
    Physically located in Washington DC on a 5Mbs connection.
  • sobri, on 05/29/2009, -0/+3I used to live by Firebug for web dev. But Safari's element inspector has taken over for most things now. It's just plain better.

    Firefox + Firebug + Firephp is still the best combo for Javascript and some server side debugging though.
  • ducati321, on 05/29/2009, -1/+4If you're using .NET architecture, you should set autoevent wireup to false in the markup - then explicitly define/implement the page_load event. This will prevent the other 25 preload events (which you almost never use) from firing and decrease load time. and you can still use them, you just have to explicitly define them.
  • inactive, on 05/29/2009, -0/+3I was too. It's always entertaining to read articles about web design on a poorly designed page but this wasn't the case here.
  • keyo, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2All these tips are good for front end, but they don't really take scalability into account.
    Some sites are slow simply because of poorly configured hosting. Sometimes you need to tune apache/nginx, if you run php enable APC on it of course. You can always use a page caching module for your cms too.
  • Jektal, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2Everyone should also try out Chrome's Inspect Element, I can't stand using Chrome for everything, but I do like their Inspect better than Firebug's
  • Lorddias, on 05/29/2009, -1/+3I was actually impressed with how fast his page loaded.. We need more website developers to follow this guys lead.
  • rmxz, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2Yet despite breaking validation - it will make the user experience better for most (all?) users.

    IMHO the best outcome here would be if the practice of "SCRIPT at the bottom" becomes common enough that it gets added to a future version of the spec.
  • trs21219, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2its better to put the scripts towards the end of the page as it lets the css, images, and content render before javascript tries to interact with it.
  • HigherLogic, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2http://internetsupervision.com/scripts/urlcheck/ch ...
  • AngelBunny, on 05/29/2009, -1/+34.308 USA west coast
    second time was 1.337 seconds (no really it was)
  • Jektal, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2Looks like the article has been updated now to accommodate that.
  • DCstewieG, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2And don't forget YSlow.
  • TheSkunkMonkey, on 05/29/2009, -0/+2Eliminate your distance by running a web server on your machine. This way you can check your load times without being affected by internet bottlenecks over which you have no control.

    I recommend that anyone creating websites run a local server for testing. It allows you to test changes without pooching your live site when you make a mistake.
  • sankaroms, on 05/29/2009, -2/+3Excellent tool. Thank you so much.
  • IamNomad, on 05/31/2009, -0/+1This man is correct ,informative and deserves your diggs.
  • insanebrain, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1long.. .(europe)
  • insanebrain, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1true. . I started using opendns last week.. . and it makes a good difference.
  • beingdevious, on 05/29/2009, -0/+18.55 seconds.
    US, FL
  • Yage2006, on 05/30/2009, -0/+1I find using adblock speeds up loading of sits by allot :)
  • keyo, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1Actually scratch that I just looked up your host. It appears to be one of those ***** clone companies godaddy owns. Get the ***** off that and onto some real hosting like a vps as slicehost or fsckvps. Though most hosting should be able to handle wordpress anyway.
  • mrsharpoblunto, on 05/29/2009, -1/+2There is a product called the RPO (www.getrpo.com) which automatically does most of these tips. It combines page requests, creates css sprites, and adds cache headers to page resources. It doesn't require any code changes to the site as it works by dynamically rewriting the content as it is sent to the client.
  • newl, on 05/29/2009, -1/+2If you're going to mention one, you may as well mention the other majorly (which is probably more used than the Safari tool) used item which is Firebug.
  • newl, on 05/29/2009, -5/+6Placing SCRIPT elements within the BODY, WILL break validation. The author is talking out of his/her ass. Just because it loads quick does not mean that it validates, nor will the client accept that as a solution.
  • IamNomad, on 05/31/2009, -0/+1in scaling , page cacheing will save you.
    less database call == faster render == happy users.
  • maz2331, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1You should install a Wordpress cache plugin if you don't already have one. Either wp-cache or wp-super-cache will boost site performance in a huge way.

  • P5ycHo, on 05/30/2009, -0/+1Digg, pay attention.
  • kaosethema, on 05/30/2009, -0/+1most people ASSume that everybody has a (consistently functioning) hi-speed internet connection.
  • keyo, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1You need to optimize your server if since it was definitely over 5s for me in New Zealand. Check out WP-super cache for wordpress. This will cache the pages which is effective for speeding up content to non-logged in users.

    You also need to check the real problem in your server, why is it so slow? If you're on shared hosting you can't really do much here. If your on a VPS then you can tune it heaps.

    Doesn't look like a network issue, I get normal ping and traceroute times, your server just has a bottle neck servicing wordpress/php.
  • Nephersir7, on 05/30/2009, -0/+1It's not Safari's, but rather Webkit's, bacause it is basically the same in Chromium/Google Chrome
  • inactive, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1I use OpenDNS and I see porn just fine.
  • TyIzaeL, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1I agree on multiple domains, but CSS sprites are rather easy to implement.
  • IamNomad, on 05/31/2009, -0/+1Because everyone does it , it must be correct ?
  • wassim2k, on 05/30/2009, -0/+1The only thing stopping my browser in its tracks and slowing page loads for me are ad banners and images. Every time my browser is no longer responding it's because of some ad loading (e.g., "waiting for ***adclick.com/... on the status bar).
  • christianc, on 05/29/2009, -0/+1Rehash. Burried.
  • inactive, on 05/30/2009, -0/+1If speed is an issue, get Google Chrome. I use both Chrome and Firefox depending on my needs. Although lately, I've been using Chrome more and more. That quickness is addictive! Firefox feels so slow now. :(
  • Jektal, on 05/29/2009, -1/+1This article is for web developers, not end-users.
  • bipolarruledout, on 05/29/2009, -1/+1Lots and lots and animated gifs.
  • TheSkunkMonkey, on 05/29/2009, -1/+1OpenDNS.org is great if you don't mind censored surfing. Try visiting a porn site with them as your DNS provider.

    I used them until I started getting pages with a message saying the page was blocked for one reason or another.
  • cavar, on 05/29/2009, -1/+1***** it, page won't load!
  • ladfrombrad, on 05/29/2009, -0/+04.501 sec's. UK.
  • scoro, on 05/29/2009, -0/+010.492 seconds
  • luteslinger, on 05/29/2009, -2/+2None of these work as good as simply changing your DNS servers to resolve at OpenDNS.org
  • PatrickX, on 05/29/2009, -1/+1Everyone puts script elements within the body... look at the source of this very page or of some the most highly regarded uses of javascript, gmail and google maps. In fact, google analytics and other analytics actually require you to put their script right before the closing of the body tag.
  • cplusplus, on 05/29/2009, -1/+1Most of these things are impractical (eg multiple domains) and a pain to do (CSS sprites).
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