Whether you’re running a personal blog, eCommerce storefront or an official portal for members, WordPress is as powerful as it is versatile. Unlike traditional static HTML websites, WordPress makes it quick and easy to establish an online presence. While this is fantastic for those with little online development experience, it’s not without a major consideration.
Installing and cultivating a visually stunning website needs only your imagination and a few clicks of your mouse. However, while this ease allows novice website owners access to dynamic visual designs, it also makes it easier to bog down your site. As millions of WordPress owners already know, dragging down WordPress speed and performance is as easy as creating a blog post.
If you’re searching for a powerful and effortless way to begin boosting your WordPress speed and performance, there are several tips guaranteed to restore the functionality you and your viewers crave. While these tips are universally effective, if your site still runs sluggish, it’s time to dive deeper into the infrastructure of server and database communication. It’s possible your issues are due to a more serious culprit.
Tip #1 | Refine Comment-Heavy Pages
User engagement is thrilling for website owners, and essential for Google ranking. While excessive commenting is a goal for many websites, if left unchecked, this may cause serious detriment to your site performance and speed.
The best way to handle this situation is to paginate your comments into multiple pages. This is done in your WordPress dashboard under SETTINGS and DISCUSSIONS. Limiting the number of comments for a single page boosts response time as the entire comment thread isn’t automatically loaded.
Tip #2 | Removed Old and Unused Media (Including Themes)
Has your WordPress suddenly become a storage space? As your site grows and evolves, you’re bound to collect a vast array of media files, plugins and themes. Even though these files aren’t displayed on your site, they still take up essential server and database resources.
Freeing up your database and server from unnecessary and unused media files is an essential maintenance task capable of adding much-needed boost to your site. The easiest way to carry out this task is with the Media Cleaner plugin. However, you may also carry this task out manually by entering your Media Library, Plugin Directory and Theme Directory then simply delete everything you no longer need.
Tip #3 | Minify Your WordPress Files
WordPress is amazing, but it also creates bulky code files, such as HTML, JavaScript and CSS stylesheets. One of the most effective ways to speed up on-page loading and response times is through the art of compression. While your images and other media files should always be compressed and resized prior to uploading to WordPress, you should also make sure your actual website files are also compressed.
The easiest way to carry out this task is via minification. There are multiple ways you can do this task, but the most streamlined method is to minify your files via a trust plugin, such as Autoptimize, WP Rocket and Fast Velocity Minify. Simply install one of these plugins and follow the prompts.
