How long does it take for your website to load? Are you delivering a satisfying user experience? Page speed information has the answers. Although there are many factors that determine the ranking of a website, there is one that can make the difference when two sites are “on par”: the user experience.
And the recharge time is the factor that most influences it. This weather is composed of a number of elements that, in the worst case scenario and according to current Google guidelines, negatively impact the experience of your users.
Being aware of this problem, Google provides us with a free tool called Page speed information, with which we can carry out a performance check and solve problems that affect its performance in both the desktop and mobile versions. Keep reading!
What is PageSpeed Insights?
Google PageSpeed Insights is a free optimization tool that allows us to monitor some of the factors that influence the loading speed of a website. That is, the time required for the user to correctly view the different contents of a URL.
This tool performs a single segmented analysis in 2 dedicated versions: desktop and mobile. The goal is to give the webmaster as global an idea as possible about the time it takes for the user to view their content and what things can affect this load.
This way, the website owner will be able to evaluate and find out what improvements to implement to provide an optimal experience and improve their SEO.
PageSpeed Insight is based on the satisfaction of 3 fundamental aspects
- Greatly reduce the number of HTTP calls made.
- Modernize the rendering of URLs within users’ browsers.
- Greatly reduce the number of responses after an HTTP request.
Due to user discontent with loading times, Google has announced an update that has given higher rankings to websites that meet PageSpeed standards.
How does PageSpeed Insight work?
How Google PageSpeed Insights works is very simple and intuitive to understand.
When we access the official portal of the tool, we will see a text field where we will have to enter the domain of our website or the URL address that we want to analyze.
After entering the URL and pressing the button “To analyze”will start the analysis for a few seconds.
At the end of the process, PageSpeed will show us a score based on a range from 0 to 100 with the respective color (red, yellow or green), taking into account several factors: performance, accessibility, best practices and SEO.
The tool will also offer us a list with various recommendations to improve the loading speed, these too have their own color (red, yellow or green) depending on their severity.
Let’s see what each one means:
Green colour
The analysis will be considered as “Perfect” if the score is between 90 and 100 points, highlighting it in green and indicating that the analyzed URL has a very good loading level.
Yellow color
The analysis will be considered as “Normal or can be improved” If the score fluctuates between 50 and 89 points, highlighted in yellow, at this point it is advisable to apply the advice and guidance provided by PageSpeed Insight to optimize loading times.
Red
The analysis will be considered as “Place” If the score goes from 1 to 49 points highlighted in red, this state is the worst of all, so you have to act on it by following the tool’s recommendations to the letter.
Top metrics provided by Google PageSpeed Insights
PageSpeed Insights presents a report that combines field data (based on the previous 28 days) with lab data (simulate and analyze a visit to your website with Google Lighthouse).
General data of the field
Find out what your real users are experiencing:
Field data includes Core Web Vitals metrics (LCP, FID, CLS), which evaluate three key aspects of UX: speed, interactivity, and visual stability.
This data contains all the information from 28 days ago and details the interactions received by users to obtain the following data:
FCP extension
He Happy first paint o FCP refers to the elapsed time between the user’s first access to the web portal and the presentation of the content.
Eng
He Interaction with Next Paint is a new metric in an experimental phase that measures the responsiveness of a website through all interactions which are made on one page.
FID
He First entry delay o FID measures the maximum response time dedicated to the reaction of a first interaction between the user and the website. This metric will be replaced in 2024 by INP.
LCP extension
The LCP or The greatest content paint It covers the time intervals used from the user’s first login to the full load of a website’s content in its entirety.
CLS extension
The Cumulative Layout Swift or Cumulative Design Displacement, is in charge of calculating the visual stability of a website, by measuring and capturing the total number of design displacements that unexpectedly occur on the site.
TTFB extension
The Time To First Byte means “Time to First Byte”. This metric represents how long the browser has to wait to receive the first byte from the server. The later, the longer it will take for the page to appear. Therefore, it will indicate if the server is too slow.
Laboratory technical data
Diagnose your website performance issues:
Laboratory data is obtained by simulating the loading of a website on a device through a mobile network, thus generating speed measurements and collecting this data.
For this task, the tool Google Lighthouse is in charge of carrying out the entire procedure. These are the values it takes into consideration, and the weight of each of them, to calculate the performance.
Let’s see what the threshold values of the laboratory data are:
Final Cut Pro (First Paint Content)
- High Speed (Green): FCP between 0 and 1.8 seconds.
- Normal Speed (Yellow): FCP between 1.8 and 3 seconds.
- Slow Speed (Red): FCP greater than 3 seconds.
Speed Index (Speed Index)
This index reflects the loading speed of a page.
- Fast Speed (Green): Speed rating between 0 and 3.4 seconds.
- Regular speed (yellow): speed index between 3.4 and 5.8 seconds.
- Low speed (red): speed index above 5.8 seconds.
LCP (largest paint with content)
- High speed (green): LCP between 0 and 2.5 seconds.
- Regular speed (yellow): LCP between 2.5 and 4 seconds.
- Low speed (red): LCP greater than 4 seconds.
TBT (Total Block Time)
This metric captures the total time it takes for a page to be interactive. If the block time is long, the user experience will be bad, as he will have to wait too long to be able to interact.
- High speed (green): TBT between 0 and 0.3 seconds.
- Regular speed (yellow): TBT between 0.3 and 0.6 seconds.
- Low speed (red): TBT greater than 0.6 seconds.
CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift)
- Fast speed (green): CLS between 0 and 10%.
- Regular speed (yellow): CLS between 10 and 25%.
- Low speed (red): CLS above 25%.
Opportunity
This is a section dedicated to highlighting the critical points to improve and the actions to be taken to optimize the loading speed of a website.
Diagnostics
Similarly to the opportunities section, the diagnostics represents in text format all the faults found and the respective actions to be carried out to correct them.
Proven audits
Here are all the positive points of your website, as well as optimized elements that you should keep in the same state.
4 keys to improve your Google PageSpeed Insights score
Now, let’s see the keys that will help you get a better score and position in the Google index:
1. Choose a good hosting
Choosing a good hosting for your website is the key to loading speed. Hosting is one of the fundamental pillars that your website is built on, so make sure they are solid.
2. Optimize web visual material
Image optimization is a deciding factor when it comes to a good Google PageSpeed Insight rating.
Having an optimal comprehension process in the images we use on our website results in a shorter loading time and has a positive impact on the final score assigned by the tool.
3. Minimize resources
The resource minimization process helps a lot in lightening up your CSS, JavaScript and HTML files by removing unnecessary code from the files. This results in a less cluttered setup which reduces loading times.
4. Improve server response times
According to the standards set by Google PageSpeed Insight, a good server should provide a response time of less than 0.2 seconds.
5. Reduce the number of redirects
Excessive redirects cause slowdowns and also end up affecting the Crawl Budget, I recommend taking structural actions to reduce the amount.
Conclusion
You already know the importance of loading speed on a web page, from now on you should pay more attention to this study that you can carry out with PageSpeed Insight to provide a more complete experience.
Make sure you apply each of the tips and advice generated by the tool and you get a fast, optimized and extremely comfortable website for both Google and your visitors.
The beauty of all this is that in the end you will be rewarded with a more privileged position and a longer stay.
Did you find the Google PageSpeed Insights tool useful?
Have you used this powerful tool on your website?
Leave me a comment telling your experience!
