Why is my website so slow?

Slowness/high CPU usage could be due to (but not limited to):
– A poor or memory intensive theme. Switch to the WordPress default theme and test loading time and see if you see a difference. If you do, may be your theme can be re-written to be more efficient.
– Poor or memory intensive plugins. One by one disable plugins and test loading time and see if you see a difference. If you do, may be that plugin can be re-written to be more efficient.
– your server is slow (e.g., “process hang”, overload, you get a lot of visitors, other problems, etc.); generally, every inexpensive host out there is slow.
– I don’t know if you use CloudFlare or not but if you do I would suggest deactivating it and seeing if it helps. Also sometimes a good purge of the cache on CloudFlare can help.
– Lots of images can cause slowness. Also images loaded without compression.
– Lots of external content (facebook/ gravatar/ google adds, etc.) and redirects in general tends to slow sites down.

Useful codex guide:
https://codex.www.ads-software.com/WordPress_Optimization

Hey,

The site looks really good – great work.

There’s two issues that I am seeing.

1.) it took quite awhile for your server to respond to my browser’s request for your website – so there is an issue there.

2.) While your images may not be too big – they are everywhere on the first page of your site. I have been on your site for at least 10 minutes and it is still loading images on the front page, because there are so many. This is the biggest issue.

I would try removing the blog feed from your front page or changing the blog setting to only show a summary instead of the whole post. You can change your blog settings to display a summary of the post in Settings>Reading and then find ‘For each article in a feed, show’ and click on ‘Summary’ then Save Changes. https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Settings_Reading_Screen

Your content is awesome so removing the blog feed from the front page won’t harm but will probably help people navigate your site better. I would place a few 2-3 of your favorite images in its place possibly. Add the *short code* you removed from the front page and add it to your ‘Blog’ page. And add the Blog selection to your primary menu in Appearance>Menus.

Good luck!

Thanks guys, all that info has helped. I updated my server speed and removed all the photos into summary posts, which made it less to load.
I have one other thing that i’m struggling with using WordPress/ProPhoto6.. When viewing on a mobile, the 4 square menu options appear on every page. They say “Weddings” “Engagements” “Contact” “Reviews”. I want them just on the home/front page, so they can be clicked on and go to the directed page. How do I make them appear on front page only?
Appreciate your help so much! ??
https://www.reneekate.com