Slow Page Load Times

Hi tdammon,

I understand your concern about the website speed issues highlighted in the Lighthouse audit. Check out this result -> https://share.zight.com/9ZuLp4Xb.

Let’s tackle these one by one with some practical solutions

1. Images without Size Info
   • Start by adding specific width and height attributes to your images. This helps browsers optimize the page layout during loading.
2. Trim Down JavaScript
   • To speed up JavaScript execution, consider combining and minifying your JS files. Additionally, load critical scripts separately for quicker initial page rendering.
3. Cut Down on DOM Size
   • Simplify your page structure by removing unnecessary elements. Optimize the HTML to shrink the overall DOM size. Also, implement lazy loading for elements that aren’t immediately needed.
4. Ease Up on Animations
   • Review the necessity of each animation. Too many can impact performance. If possible, switch to CSS animations, as they often perform better than JavaScript animations.

Feel free to make these changes and run another Lighthouse audit. If you have any questions along the way, don’t hesitate to ask.

Best,

Alexander

Rather than just typing your query into ChatGPT, I took at look at your site — there are LOT of images, a lot of javascript moving things around (unnecessarily, imho) and a very deep home page. You might ask the developers of your theme how best to optimize it for use in the real world.

Hello,

I reviewed your site performance https://pagespeed.web.dev/analysis/https-paragonwebdevelopment-com/ommvf7vtzo?form_factor=desktop

I have suggestions to improve site performance.

• Make a small DOM size by reducing animations , sliders and removing unnecessary Plugins.
• Fewer server requests by reducing no of elements like images, icons, and JS.
• Optimize images by Converting all PNG images into jpg or webp.
• remove unnecessary plugins

You can use a plugin for image optimization  ShortPixel TinyPNG Imagify   Smush

Hey Steve,

Thanks for the reply. I am trying to lazy load my images to cut down on FCP. I think I have that working now but it doesn’t seem to be improving load times. I do have a lot of animations. Most of them are triggered by scrolling. Would this still affect load times if the animations aren’t active on page load?

I’ll try to reach out to the theme developers and see if they have any suggestions as well.

Hey @tdammon

Good to hear you’re making progress with lazy loading images. Regarding the animations, even if they’re triggered by scrolling, they can still impact load times.

Besides reaching out to the theme developers, consider checking with your web hosting provider. Especially if you are on a shared hosting, there are limits to CPU and RAM. If exceeded, performance is throttled until it normalizes. Also, ensure your cache plugin is set up correctly for optimal performance.

Keep me posted on how it goes, and feel free to ask for more help!

Best,

Hi @iamkenrocks

Thanks for the input! I have reached out to my hosting provider because I noticed that my Time To First Byte was around 1s. I am also using CloudFlare CDN so not sure if I should be reaching out to them too.

A couple of questions. Does the CPU and RAM from my hosting plan affect performance after TTFB? I was under the impression that once the browser received files from the server performance was based on execution times.

Lastly, how would I know if my cache plugin is set up correctly? I tried running speed tests with various settings turned on and then again with them turned off (minification, async JS, image optimization), but I can’t see a huge difference with just one setting toggled.