Improving your GT Metrix / Lighthouse page speed score


Improving your website’s performance according to Google’s PageSpeed Insights and GTmetrix tests involves various optimizations aimed at enhancing both the speed and user experience. Here are 10 steps to help you achieve better scores:

  1. Optimize Images: Compress and resize images to reduce their file size without compromising quality. Use tools like Photoshop, Squoosh, or online services like TinyPNG or ImageOptim.
  2. Leverage Browser Caching: Configure your server to set cache-control headers for static resources like images, CSS, and JavaScript files. This allows browsers to store these resources locally, reducing the need to download them on subsequent visits.
  3. Minify CSS, JavaScript, and HTML: Remove unnecessary characters like comments, whitespace, and newline characters from your CSS, JavaScript, and HTML files to reduce their size. Use tools like UglifyJS or online minifiers.
  4. Enable Gzip Compression: Enable Gzip compression on your server to reduce the size of your website’s files transferred over the network. Most web servers support Gzip compression, and you can usually enable it via configuration files.
  5. Optimize Critical Rendering Path: Prioritize the loading of critical resources such as CSS and JavaScript needed to render above-the-fold content. Inline critical CSS and defer non-critical JavaScript to speed up initial page rendering.
  6. Reduce Server Response Time (TTFB): Optimize your server infrastructure, database queries, and server-side code to minimize the time it takes for the server to respond to requests. Consider using caching mechanisms and optimizing database queries.
  7. Eliminate Render-Blocking Resources: Identify and defer render-blocking resources, such as CSS and JavaScript, that prevent the browser from rendering content quickly. Use async or defer attributes for non-essential scripts, and inline critical CSS.
  8. Optimize Fonts: Limit the number of font styles and weights used on your website to reduce the number of font requests. Additionally, consider using font-display: swap; CSS property to ensure text remains visible during font loading.
  9. Implement Content Delivery Network (CDN): Utilize a CDN to distribute your website’s static resources across multiple servers worldwide, reducing latency and improving load times for users in different geographic locations.
  10. Regularly Monitor and Test: Continuously monitor your website’s performance using tools like Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, or Pingdom. Regularly test and fine-tune your optimizations to maintain and improve performance over time.

By implementing these steps, you can significantly improve your website’s performance metrics according to Google PageSpeed Insights and GTmetrix tests, leading to better user experiences and potentially higher search engine rankings.