WordPress acceleration: how to make your website lightning fast
Did you know that the attention span of humans is now shorter than that of a goldfish? According to statistics, in 2000 it was 12 seconds, today it is only 8 seconds.
What does this mean for you, the website owner? It means that no time to wait.
If your WordPress website doesn't load immediately, your visitors will simply close the window and go to your competitors. What's more, Google also „penalises” slow websites: they are ranked lower in the search results.
In this article, we've gathered the most effective ways to speed up WordPress - from simple setup to professional website optimization tricks.
Why is website speed critical (Not just a vanity question!)
Sitementor's experience also shows that website load speed has a direct impact on your business results:
For visitors 47%-a expects the page to load in 2 seconds.
For buyers 79%-a, who is dissatisfied with the speed, will never shop on that site again.
Already 1 second delay also reduces conversion (sales) by 7%.
In short: A slow website costs money.
7 steps to speed up your WordPress site
Step 1: Choosing the Right Site (The Basis of WordPress Acceleration)
This is the most important point. Imagine you're trying to drive a Formula 1 car (your website), but it has a lawnmower engine (your hosting) in it. It is useless to do any technical SEO or optimization if the server is slow.
Many „cheap” providers cram hundreds of websites onto a single server. If your neighbour gets heavy traffic, your site slows down.
The SiteMentor Recommendation: We've been testing the market for years, and Sybell we voted for.
NVMe SSD technology: Lightning-fast data loading.
Hungarian servers: Domestic visitors can access it immediately.
LiteSpeed technology: Specifically optimized for WordPress.
💡 Tip: If you order hosting from Sybell, use the "SITEMENTOR" coupon code, and 10% discount you get!
2. Install an efficient Cache Extension
One of the fastest ways to speed up WordPress is to use caching. WordPress is a dynamic system, which is time consuming. Cache plugins (like WP Rocket) create a static copy of your site, which can load 2x-5x faster.
Because we have premium tools at SiteMentor, we can provide our customers with the best solutions.
3. Optimise your images (The Most Common Mistake)
90% of novice website owners make this mistake: they upload photos straight from their phone or camera. These pictures are huge (3-5 MB).
The rule: Never upload an unoptimised image! The huge files in the slow website number one causes of.
- Resize: A website rarely needs an image wider than 1920 pixels.
Condense: Use formats such as JPG or the new WebP.
Automate: Use a plugin (e.g. Smush, Imagify or ShortPixel), which automatically „slims down” your photos when uploaded, without any loss of quality.
4. Keep the System Clean (Updates)
WordPress, your template and your plugins are constantly evolving. Updates bring not only new features, but often speed optimizations and security fixes as well.
PHP version: Make sure that your hosting is running the latest (or stable) PHP version (currently 8.1 or 8.2 is recommended). Old PHP versions (e.g. 7.4) can be up to 50% slower!
Are you afraid to touch it because you're afraid the site will break? The SiteMentor Webmaster Service takes that burden off your shoulders.
5. Don't Upload Video Directly to WordPress!
Never. Really never. Videos are huge files. If you try to play them from your own storage, it will „eat” your bandwidth and slow down the site drastically.
The solution: Upload the video On YouTube or Vimeora and just paste the link into your website. WordPress will automatically embed it and the video sharing giants' servers will do the heavy lifting for you, keeping your website up to speed.
6. Use Excerpts on the Home Page
By default, WordPress often displays the full articles on the blog page or the home page. This means that the visitor has to load 5-10 long articles with images at once.
Set up your template so that only the articles extract from (the first few sentences) and click on the „Read more” button. This will drastically improve your mobile page load speed.
7. Organise your Plugins (Plugin Cleanup)
Too many or badly written extensions to the WordPress Acceleration your greatest enemy. What you don't use, delete completely, don't just turn it off!
Summary: A fast website generates more profit!
The speed of your website has a direct impact on your revenue. The good news is that you can do most of the above steps yourself.
The recipe in brief:
Choose the right hosting (Sybell +
SITEMENTORcode).Use caching (Cache).
Optimise your images.
Keep the system fresh.
Don't you have time to deal with this? The SiteMentor team can help! Whether you're looking for a new, lightning-fast website or want to shake up your existing one, contact us.