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If you had to build the best plugin to speed up your WordPress website, what would it look like?
Perhaps you’d want it to:
Well, you’d love to hear that such plugins actually exist, and they are listed in the following paragraphs.
But before getting to them, let’s see how we ended up with our list of plugins.
Here’s what a regular plugin test would look like:
This process works perfectly fine if you’re testing a plugin whose impact is unrelated to your visitors' experience.
When it comes to testing site speed solutions, simply adding them to a website and checking its Performance score isn’t enough. Attracting real-world users to your website is a critical part of the equation.
So, instead of focusing entirely on lab metrics, we decided to turn to the Core Web Vitals Technology Report.
The Core Web Vitals Technology Report, developed by Google engineer Rick Viscomi, provides a global overview of how 2,000+ technologies perform in relation to Google's Core Web Vitals. This report combines insights from two major sources: the Chrome UX Report (CrUX) and the HTTP Archive, both of which examine millions of websites.
More specifically, we decided to focus on three critical metrics:
For a site speed plugin to be worth it, it has to yield real-world results. In the context of web performance, this means that after installing it, your website should provide a better experience so users bounce less, browse more, and, most importantly, convert more.
The best way to evaluate user experience improvement is through Core Web Vitals.
Core Web Vitals are a set of performance metrics defined by Google that assess the quality of user experience on a website. They focus on three key aspects:
These metrics are critical for determining a site's overall user experience and are essential factors in Google's search ranking algorithms.
That said, let’s see what percentage of the origins (websites) each tool optimizes pass the Core Web Vitals assessment:
Percentage of origins that pass the Core Web Vitals assessment:
Page weight refers to all assets used to create a web page:
The more resources your website ships, the longer it takes for the browser to download, process, and render it. Furthermore, it could take even more time for a user to load your page if their internet connection is unstable.
That said, you must strike the right balance between functionality (e.g., using high-engaging elements like images, videos, and popups) and efficiency (ensuring everything loads within 3 seconds).
A great web performance plugin that offers optimizations like code minification, lazy loading, and image optimization can help with that.
Here’s how successfully our candidates optimize their websites’ page weight:
Median total page weight (KB):
Images often account for a substantial portion of a webpage's load time, making optimization in this area crucial for performance improvements. According to the Web Almanac, and building on the last point, images are the largest contributors to page weight, averaging 1,026 KB for desktop pages and 811 KB for mobile pages.
In other words, the plugin you install needs to offer a robust image optimization suite that can handle your high-quality visuals.
When it comes to serving optimized images without losing quality, this is what the data says:
The median image weight per page that each plugin serves comes at:
NitroPack is the only all-in-one web performance optimization solution on this list and has been the leader in Core Web Vitals pass rate for the last four years.
Including more than 60 features, NitroPack can offer you:
All applied automatically.
Endorsed by Google, NitroPack can easily replace all your speed optimization plugins, keeping your code lean and saving you the headache of trying to make multiple plugins work together without breaking anything.
Beyond the rich list of optimizations, NitroPack also comes with 24/7 technical support, an intuitive dashboard, and the ability to work on copies of your site’s original files.
Summary:
WP Fastest Cache is a popular WordPress caching plugin designed to improve website performance by applying more than 30 optimizations. Some of the most powerful features include:
The plugin is easy to set up, with a user-friendly interface requiring minimal configuration. WP Fastest Cache provides both free and premium versions, with the premium version offering advanced features like mobile caching and database cleanup.
Summary:
Perfmatters is designed to optimize website speed by addressing inefficiencies at the core. It provides a variety of features that help reduce page load times, such as disabling unnecessary scripts, optimizing database queries, and managing HTTP requests.
The plugin's Script Manager is a standout feature. It allows users to selectively disable JavaScript and CSS files on a per-page basis, reducing bloat and improving performance.
The truth is that Perfmatters offers a long list of technical optimizations that other plugins do not.
However, the plugin does not offer features such as caching, a built-in content delivery network (CDN), or image optimization.
In other words, it’s a complementary tool. Hence, you will need to install another 2-3 plugins with it.
Summary:
WP Rocket is a caching plugin that offers features like page caching, browser caching, GZIP compression, cache preloading, and code optimization right out of the box.
Its user-friendly interface makes it accessible to beginners, while its more powerful features, like critical CSS, cater to more advanced users.
Some things you should consider before installing WP Rocket are:
Summary:
With 30+ optimizations available, it’s safe to say that WP-Optimize is one well-rounded speed optimization plugin. It combines caching, image compression, database cleanup, and file minification into one solution.
The caching feature speeds up page load times by serving pre-generated static files, while image compression reduces the size of images without sacrificing quality. Additionally, the plugin offers advanced features like lazy loading, WebP conversion, and detailed scheduling options in its premium version.
However, keep in mind that it lacks support for third-party CDNs, and their caching and minification capabilities are not as good as some of the other options listed here.
Summary:
LiteSpeed Cache offers advanced server-level caching, which significantly improves website performance. The plugin also includes features such as:
One drawback of this solution is that while you can access LiteSpeed Cache’s general features on any server, to access their premium features, you need one of the following:
So, you must keep that in mind and see if it fits your tech stack.
Summary:
Compared to the other solutions on this list, Autoptimize isn’t as comprehensive and doesn’t offer as many advanced caching features.
However, this plugin specializes in code optimization. You will have all the control to optimize your HTML, CSS, and JS files.
Furthermore, the majority of available optimizations are suited to what you’d find as a warning in your Google PageSpeed Insights report, so you can easily fix issues with:
Summary:
W3 Total Cache is designed to enhance website performance by implementing a range of caching mechanisms, minimizing files, and integrating with content delivery networks (CDNs).
Regarding caching options, there isn’t a more comprehensive tool than W3TC.
However, advanced caching settings are nice in niche cases but may not be widely applicable. In other words, the free version of this plugin may not give you enough performance power to ace your Core Web Vitals.
On the other hand, their premium version comes with a lot more impactful optimizations like:
Just keep in mind that their Pro version comes on the pricey side, starting at $99.
Summary:
Ultimately, you want to install a site speed plugin for the results it will yield.
That said, the best way to find the right solution for you is to test and compare results.
When we say results, we mean improvements that truly matter for your business and visitors, namely Core Web Vitals, conversion rates, and engagement rates.
Disclaimer: All Core Web Vitals stats from the Chrome UX Report (as seen in Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights) are aggregated over 28 days. Hence, it’s a good rule of thumb to keep a site speed plugin enabled for at least a month so you can best evaluate its impact.
So start experimenting, and don’t forget to back up your website!
There are numerous of page speed optimization plugins for WordPress, but the most popular ones include NitroPack, Perfmatters, and WP Optimize. However, the best choice depends on your specific needs and tech stack.
Improve your WordPress site speed by using caching plugins, optimizing images, minimizing CSS and JavaScript files, and using a Content Delivery Network (CDN). Relying on a high-quality web hosting provider and regularly updating your plugins and themes also helps.
Yes, poorly coded or excessive plugins can slow down your site. It's important to use only essential plugins and choose well-optimized ones.
Niko has 5+ years of experience turning those “it’s too technical for me” topics into “I can’t believe I get it” content pieces. He specializes in dissecting nuanced topics like Core Web Vitals, web performance metrics, and site speed optimization techniques. When he’s taking a breather from researching his next content piece, you’ll find him deep into the latest performance news.
