I am trying to: get my website back on speed
Link to a page where the issue can be seen: hidden link / hidden link
I expected to see: Faster website (like before using toolset)
Instead, I got: slow website
Hi,
Thank you for contacting us and I'd be happy to assist.
If you'll check your website's page(s) through speed/performance testing tools like Pingdom ( hidden link ), Google's page speed insights ( hidden link ) and GTmetrix ( hidden link ), you'll find the common issues related to two main points:
1. Use of large and un-optimized image sizes.
2. Eliminate render-blocking resources and apply cache headers to the static resources.
The images used on your website, have sizes in MBs, which is not efficient and adds up to the page loading times. It would be a good idea to optimize them so that they're at least half of the current size.
For the second point, you'll need a good cache and code optimization plugin, which can add expiry headers to static resources ( like images, CSS and script files, etc ).
Your website seems to be using the WP-Super-Cache plugin, but you might need to consult its official support and documentation to learn about the most optimal settings and features, to take care of those highlighted points.
If you'd like to consider switching to a different optimization plugin with more features, the following article reviews some of the popular options:
hidden link
You'll also find some very useful suggestions on speeding up a WordPress website, in this guide:
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I hope this helps.
regards,
Waqar
Thank you for your time. Unfortunately it was not really helping. I'm down from 13 seconds preload to 12.5.
I optimized the few large images and WP Super Cache.
Yet the main reason the website got WAY slower, is the toolset plugin. I didn't have any issues of the website being slow before or with any other websites I did with WordPress (even portfolios for photography / film with way bigger data values). Is there anything else I can do?
During further testing in a couple of different browsers and speed testing tools, those pages load well under 10 seconds for me.
Are you testing this while logged in as the administrator user? It is expected and normal that there is a prominent variance in the loading times, depending on whether you view the page as a logged-in administrator or as a regular user/visitor:
1. The optimization and cache plugins, exclude the optimizations for the administrators so that they can always view the original and up-to-date output of the website, without any delay in changes due to cached content. If administrators are also shown optimized and cached content, it will cause a delay in the changes, confusing them that the changes they are making are not working at all.
3. On top of that, WordPress and activity tracking plugins also perform additional administrative tasks in the background when you're viewing the page as an administrator. This also adds up to loading speed, making you think that the website is slow.
For these reasons, I'll recommend using a non-administrator user account with the role that most of your users will be using, to analyze the real user experience and page loading times. The administrator user account will not give you the true picture, in this case.
In case, you still don't see any difference in the loading times, you're welcome to share temporary admin login details so that I can see how different elements are set up and suggest some more improvements, accordingly.
Note: Your next reply will be private and though no changes will be made on your website, it is recommended to make a complete backup copy, before sharing the access details.
