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June 19, 2024

7 Best WordPress CDN Services in 2024 (Compared)

We get thousands of global visitors every day on WPBeginner, so we know how important content delivery networks are for website performance.

A CDN is a service that can significantly speed up your website. It works by caching and serving your website content from the servers nearest to your user’s location, reducing your page load time.

While we use Cloudflare on our own site, we know there are lots of other great options for WordPress users. That’s why we have tested the top options on the market, paying attention to the location and number of data centers, pricing, and user-friendliness.

In this article, we will show you the best WordPress CDN providers to speed up your website.

Expert Tip: Are you looking for more ways to speed up your WordPress website? It might be time to call in the experts.

Our experts will do a full performance audit on your website and then optimize it for lightning-fast loading times. Check out our WPBeginner Site Speed Optimization Service today!

How Does a CDN Help WordPress Sites?

A CDN is a global network of servers that saves your website’s static content, such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files, in a cache. When a user visits your site, the CDN will serve the content from the server closest to the user, making it load faster.

With a CDN, your website will be much faster and less likely to crash when the traffic is high. This is because your site will rely on multiple CDN servers (called edge servers) instead of just a single origin server to deliver your content.

Here are some benefits of using a CDN:

You get a faster page load speed. CDNs can decrease latency, or the time it takes for a server to deliver content to a browser.
Your site will also be more SEO-friendly. This is because Google prioritizes web pages with good user experience, such as how fast your pages load.
You get better uptime. CDNs use load balancing, so when one of the edge servers fails, the others can cover for it and keep the site running.
You can make your WordPress website more secure against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. The CDN will absorb and route the attack’s traffic to the network of servers to avoid overwhelming the origin server.
You can reduce your WordPress hosting’s bandwidth usage, meaning you won’t need to upgrade to a more expensive hosting plan.

For these reasons, many WordPress website owners use CDNs to make their sites faster and more secure. So, let’s take a look at some of the top WordPress CDN services and how they stack up against each other.

Why Trust WPBeginner?

At WPBeginner, we have 16+ years of experience in running WordPress websites, optimizing them for speed, and reaching readers all over the world. We have also thoroughly tested each of the CDN services mentioned in this article.

For more details, just see our editorial process.

1. Bunny.net

Out of all the CDN services we have reviewed, Bunny.net is the best WordPress CDN on the market. Their WordPress plugin is easy and fast to set up, so you can start using the CDN right away.

Our team has been using Bunny CDN on OptinMonster because their pricing is very affordable for small businesses. If you are based in North America, then the pricing is just $0.01 per GB.

Not sure how much the total will be? Bunny.net has a handy calculator you can use.

They also have data centers worldwide, so you can reach users anywhere they are based. Simply select one of its 123 PoP (point of presence) locations across North America, South America, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Oceania.

Bunny.net knows that beginner WordPress users may be new to CDN services. That’s why they provide 24/7 customer support through live chat to help their customers, and they typically respond within an average of 5 minutes.

Pros of Bunny.net:

User-friendly control panel to manage your CDN features, like activating your free SSL certificate in one click or clearing your cache to keep your content updated.
Wide network coverage with its 123 and growing PoP locations.
Video CDN to load videos faster.
Up to 80% image optimization to reduce the size of your image files.
99.99% global Service Level Agreement, which means if your website is down, you will be eligible for credits to offset any loss caused by the outage.
Real-time analytics to help you pinpoint performance issues on your website.

Cons of Bunny.net:

There is no free tier, though there is a 14-day free trial.

Why we recommend Bunny.net: This high-performance CDN service is one of the best options for beginner WordPress users. Despite their affordability, Bunny.net has everything you need to make your website faster and offer a better user experience.

2. Cloudflare

Cloudflare is known as the best free CDN for small business WordPress websites. With a global network of 310 cities and 120 countries, you can rest assured that your site will always be online.

Setting up Cloudflare CDN in WordPress is easy. All you need to do is sign up for a plan, add your website to Cloudflare, and replace your domain’s nameservers with Cloudflare’s.

Cloudflare’s free plan also includes unmetered DDoS protection. This means Cloudflare will detect and mitigate DDoS attacks without limiting the traffic volume that can be protected.

We actually use Cloudflare for their paid security and CDN services on WPBeginner, and we have been very happy with their fast performance, huge CDN network, and excellent uptime.

For more details, you can see why we switched from Sucuri to Cloudflare.

Pros of Cloudflare:

Cloudflare’s global network coverage is vast.
The CDN has a built-in web application firewall to protect users against not just DDoS attacks but also other threats, like email spammers.
Simple bot mitigation to differentiate legitimate bots, like search engine crawlers, from malicious bots like DDoS attackers or phishing campaigns.
Special tools to handle dynamic content caching and delivery to make your site faster.

Cons of Cloudflare:

There is no uptime guarantee for Free and Pro plan users.
Direct support is only available for paid plan users.

Why we recommend Cloudflare: We use a paid Cloudflare plan on WPBeginner for our security and CDN needs. Overall, we appreciate how fast the Cloudflare CDN is, along with its advanced firewall rules to keep our website safe.

3. Sucuri

Sucuri is one of the most popular website security companies out there. Besides offering powerful website security features, they provide an easy-to-use CDN that’s optimized for WordPress.

To use Sucuri’s CDN, you need to sign up for one of their website security platform plans, which includes a web application firewall (WAF).

You can then add your site to the WAF, activate the firewall by changing your site’s DNS settings, and choose a CDN caching option. Besides speeding up your site and preventing DDoS attacks, the WAF also blocks spam and malware.

Sucuri’s data centers are vast, with locations in North America, Europe, and Asia. They also have CDN edge servers operating on Amazon Web Services in Australia and Brazil.

Pros of Sucuri:

According to Sucuri, they can improve website performance by 60%.
Multiple caching options, so you can choose the one that suits your site’s needs best. These include minimal caching, which is great if your site has lots of dynamic content (e.g., personalized text).
Automatic SSL certificate installation for your firewall server to protect your data as it is being transmitted.
Automatic malware removal, meaning Sucuri will delete any malware that it detects right away.
For small business owners, Sucuri offers a basic firewall with CDN plans that start at $9.99 per month.

Cons of Sucuri:

You cannot use the CDN alone as you have to purchase it with Sucuri’s main security features.

Why we recommend Sucuri: Sucuri is a great option if you are looking for a combination of WordPress security features and a CDN. It’s also pretty affordable, making it an excellent choice for small businesses.

4. KeyCDN

KeyCDN is another good option for a WordPress CDN service. It has a user-friendly CDN Enabler plugin that can automatically rewrite your website URLs to serve them through the CDN.

With the CDN Enabler plugin, you get more control over how your CDN works. For example, you can select what type of files need to be served using the CDN to focus on only the essential elements of your website.

You can also instantly purge your CDN cache right from your admin area. As a result, you can keep your website content up-to-date.

KeyCDN’s network of servers is spread across the Americas, Africa, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Oceanic regions. This way, your site always performs fast no matter where your audience is.

Pros of KeyCDN:

High-performance CDN with support for HTTP/2, GZIP compression, IPv6 support, and image processing, all of which are important features that contribute to faster load times.
Instant CDN purge right from the CDN Enabler plugin to easily update your website content.
Pay-as-you-go pricing with a low minimum charge of $4 per month.
Free 14-day trial with no credit card required.

Cons of KeyCDN:

Despite the low minimum charge, you must purchase a minimum of $49 worth of credit to use KeyCDN.

Why we recommend KeyCDN: This CDN service’s wide network coverage, easy-to-use plugin, and affordable pricing make it worth recommending for small business owners who are just starting out. Just remember to have at least $49 worth of credit in your account to use it.

5. RocketCDN

RocketCDN is a WordPress CDN service offered by the same team as WP Rocket, one of the most popular WordPress caching plugins. That plugin has powered over 3 million websites, so you know you are in good hands with RocketCDN.

RocketCDN is powered by Bunny.net, which means they also have a global network of over 120 edge locations. However, what makes them different is their respective pricing models.

Instead of a pay-as-you-go scheme, RocketCDN comes in a single plan costing $8.99 per month. This already includes unlimited bandwidth for all regions, so you won’t have to worry about hitting any data caps or slow speeds due to limited resources.

When you activate RocketCDN, they will automatically adjust the settings of your website to ensure that it runs smoothly and quickly. These settings include Gzip compression and serving assets over HTTP/2.

Pros of RocketCDN:

Monthly pricing with unlimited bandwidth, which can be a good option if you don’t want the hassle of calculating your own resource usage.
Easy WordPress setup, as you only need to install their plugin and activate their API key.
Everything is enabled for you once the CDN is active, from Gzip compression, and HTTP/2 support, to serving all images using CDN.
Automatic canonical header setup so that search engines know which version of your website to show even though some of your assets are served using a CDN address.

Cons of RocketCDN:

Compared to other CDN solutions on the list, RocketCDN’s features may seem too basic.
No free trial.

Why we chose RocketCDN: Many WPBeginner users use WP Rocket for their websites, and RocketCDN is one of the best solutions to complement this caching plugin.

6. Imperva

Imperva is a cyber security company that offers many website and application protection solutions, including a CDN. They have 62+ data centers with 10 TB per second capacity, which is very high.

If your site receives 1 million visitors per day, and each visitor downloads 1 MB of data, Imperva could handle all that traffic without breaking a sweat.

Additionally, Imperva has self-service customization. This means you can decide how content is cached or traffic is routed based on factors like device type and user location. This feature can help optimize your website’s performance and reduce costs.

Pros of Imperva:

Large bandwidth capacity to handle high traffic volume, making it perfect for online businesses.
Self-service customization feature to configure how the CDN behaves to optimize performance.
99.999% uptime guarantee with a 3-second mitigation SLA, which means downtime is extremely low, and Imperva promises to fix any issue within 3 seconds.

Cons of Imperva:

The self-service customization feature may be too advanced for the average WordPress user.
There is no fixed pricing, and you have to contact their team for custom pricing.

Why we chose Imperva: When reviewing Imperva, we were thoroughly impressed by their high-performance CDN and advanced features that not all CDNs provide. We recommend Imperva if you have a growing, multinational business.

7. Amazon CloudFront

Last but not least, we have Amazon CloudFront. It’s a powerful WordPress CDN service for people who use Amazon services like Amazon SES and Amazon Web Services (AWS).

That said, despite its name, this WordPress CDN solution works with many other hosting providers, not just AWS.

When you use CloudFront, you will also get the AWS Shield Standard automatically enabled. This technology is like a more comprehensive version of DDoS protection, securing your website against attacks at all network layers.

Amazon CloudFront has 600+ points of presence in 90 cities across 47 countries, so its CDN service has vast coverage. It also offers a free tier that allows you to send 1 TB of data from CloudFront each month at no extra cost.

Pros of Amazon CloudFront:

Seamless integration with AWS services, so it’s a great option if you already use them.
A global network of servers, with hundreds of points of presence worldwide.
Robust security features at the edge servers to protect your content from DDoS attacks, malware, phishing, and other threats at all levels.
Generous free tier plan, as 1 TB of data transfer can serve approximately 1 billion web pages.

Cons of Amazon CloudFront:

Not the most beginner-friendly setup.

Why we chose Amazon CloudFront: If you run WordPress on AWS, then you already have a great WordPress CDN service at your disposal. The vast network and generous free-tier plan also make CloudFront worth recommending.

Bonus: Use a Hosting Provider With Free CDN

These days, many WordPress hosting providers come with their own custom CDN solutions. This way, you won’t have to pay extra to make your website fast and secure.

Hostinger, for instance, has a built-in CDN available for Business plan users or above. It includes features like WebP image compression, CSS and JavaScript minification, and a handy under-attack mode to fight rapid DDoS attacks.

SiteGround also has an excellent CDN feature designed specifically for users who receive traffic from multiple countries. The team behind it has reported that loading speeds have increased by 20% on average.

While a free plan is available, they also have a premium plan with unlimited monthly bandwidth.

On the other hand, some hosting providers like Bluehost and WP Engine have integrated third-party CDN services like Cloudflare.

Which Is the Best WordPress CDN Provider for Your Site?

After carefully evaluating all these top WordPress CDN services, we believe that Bunny.net is the best WordPress CDN on the market. It has a wide global network coverage and offers a great set of features at a reasonable price.

For people on a tight budget, Cloudflare’s free CDN plan can do the job. It comes integrated with popular web hosting providers like Bluehost and WP Engine. Plus, you get unmetered DDoS protection.

If you want a CDN focusing on security, then Sucuri is the one for you. Besides multiple caching options, you can get a powerful WAF with automatic malware removal and SSL installation.

WordPress CDN Services: Frequently Asked Questions

Now that we’ve covered the best WordPress CDN services, let’s cover some frequently asked questions about using a CDN.

Which CDN does WordPress use?

The WordPress software does not use any CDN as it is only a content management system that requires a hosting service to run. Instead, the user has the freedom to choose any CDN service they prefer.

How do I choose a CDN for my WordPress website?

To choose a CDN for your WordPress website, you can consider your website needs, your own budget, and the platform’s ease of use.

If you need a beginner-friendly CDN with affordable pricing, then look no further than Bunny.net. On the other hand, if your website handles a lot of sensitive data, then you may want a CDN with a good set of security features, like Sucuri.

Can I use Cloudflare CDN with WordPress, and how does it compare to other CDN services?

Yes, you can use Cloudflare CDN with WordPress. In fact, many hosting providers like Bluehost and WP Engine have Cloudflare integrated into their dashboards, so you can immediately use it.

While Cloudflare CDN is free, it has great unmetered DDoS protection. However, there is no direct support.

Does CDN increase website speed?

Yes, a CDN can increase your website speed and make it faster. It will cache your website content into multiple servers spread worldwide. When users visit your site, the server closest to them will deliver the content.

That said, many factors affect website speed, so we recommend implementing other best speed optimization practices as well. For more information, check out our ultimate guide to boost WordPress speed and performance.

Ultimate Guides to Boost Your WordPress Site Performance

We hope this article helped you find the best WordPress CDN solution for your website. You may also want to see our ultimate WordPress performance guide or our expert pick of the best website speed test tools.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post 7 Best WordPress CDN Services in 2024 (Compared) first appeared on WPBeginner.

April 10, 2024

5 Best WordPress Caching Plugins to Speed Up Your Website (2024)

Are you looking for the best WordPress caching plugin for your website?

Caching essentially stores a copy of your WordPress site on your server. When users open your website again, the server can simply pull up the copy so that visitors won’t have to reload your site from scratch again.

Since there are so many different WordPress cache plugins, it can feel overwhelming to pick the right option.

To help you pick the best plugin, we tested some of the best options on the market. While testing, we focused on a bunch of factors like ease of use, caching options, and price.

In this guide, we will show you the best WordPress caching plugins to improve your site speed.

In a hurry? No worries! Take a look at our top picks so you can quickly choose the right WordPress cache plugin for your site.

Ranking	Plugin	Best For	Price
#1	WP Rocket	Overall performance	$59/year	Read more
#2	WP Super Cache	Beginners	Free	Read more
#3	W3 Total Cache	Multiple caching options	Free + paid	Read more
#4	Sucuri	Firewall + caching	$9.99/month	Read more
#5	Cache Enabler	Simple caching	Free	Read more

Why Use a WordPress Caching Plugin?

Using a WordPress caching plugin is one of the easiest ways to increase your website speed. When installed, the caching plugin will store parts of your site (like static HTML files, CSS files, JavaScript files, and so on) on your server.

Every time someone visits your site, they are served the cached version of the site instead of having to wait for your server to load the web pages from the beginning.

By storing cached pages of your site, a caching plugin drastically reduces the amount of processing required to serve those pages. Some cache content at the server level and others leverage browser caching. This leads to:

A faster website and better WordPress SEO. Search engines give a significant SEO advantage to fast web pages, which helps you rank higher in search results.
More power to handle larger amounts of traffic without slowing down your site performance or affecting your uptime. This is important if you run an eCommerce website.

Plus, caching can create a better user experience. Users who visit your site will experience faster page loading times, making it less likely for them to bounce from your site.

The probability of bounce increases 32% as page load time goes from 1 second to 3 seconds.
Think with Google

How We Tested and Reviewed WordPress Caching Plugins

We used them on our websites: Throughout the years, we have used different WordPress cache plugins on our websites to improve our site performance.
We tested the most popular plugins: We tested some of the most popular caching plugins on the market to see if they are worth the hype. We analyzed those plugins based on the following factors: ease of use, features, types of caching, and pricing.
We categorized them based on your needs: Not every website will benefit from the same caching plugin. That’s why we analyzed all the features to help you decide which tool fits your needs.

Why Trust WPBeginner

At WPBeginner, we are a dedicated team of people with over 16 years of experience in WordPress, design, and online marketing. Our WordPress experts extensively review each plugin or tool that is featured here and thoroughly test them on real websites. To learn more, you can see our complete editorial process.

1. WP Rocket

After trying out different plugins from this list, we found WP Rocket to be the overall best WordPress caching plugin. It is the easiest and most beginner-friendly option, which is a big help if you are new to this topic.

With WP Rocket, WordPress users can instantly cache their website with just one click. Once the plugin is activated, its crawler automatically fetches the WordPress pages to build up the cache.

The plugin then automatically turns on the recommended WordPress caching settings. These include page caching, cache preloading, Gzip compression, browser caching, and mobile device caching.

WP Rocket also offers optional features to configure to improve your website performance further. These include lazy loading images, CDN (content delivery network) support, minification, and more.

Pros of WP Rocket:

User-friendly plugin interface for beginners.
Essential caching functions are available out of the box, from page caching and browser caching to mobile device caching.
Additional optimization features to speed up your website loading time, like options to minify CSS files and enable a CDN integration.
Advanced features like database optimization, multisite support, and cache exclusions based on URLs or cookies.
Supports caching for dynamic content, including WooCommerce cart items.

Cons of WP Rocket:

Unfortunately, there is no free version, but WP Rocket does offer a 14-day money-back guarantee.

Pricing: Starting from $59 per year for one website, product updates, and support.

Why we chose WP Rocket: We have reviewed WP Rocket before at WPBeginner, and we strongly recommend it as the best WordPress caching plugin on the market. While there is no free version, its prices are quite affordable compared to other paid options.

You can also check out our step-by-step guide on how to install and set up WP Rocket in WordPress.

2. WP Super Cache

WP Super Cache is a popular, free caching plugin created by Automattic, the company that runs WordPress.com.

This WordPress caching plugin has 2 caching settings: Expert and Simple. The first one is a much faster option than the other because it doesn’t execute any PHP scripts, but it does require you to edit your .htaccess file.

The second is a happy medium between fast site loading speed and ease of use. We recommend choosing this method instead if you are not confident editing your own .htaccess file.

Other than that, WP Super Cache includes other speed optimization features like cache preloading. This setting will generate cached files of your pages, posts, categories, and tags that are ready to load as soon as someone accesses the content for the first time.

Pros of WP Super Cache:

Completely free of charge.
Advanced caching settings are available, such as expert caching that can handle high traffic and custom caching options to control how the plugin works.
Cache garbage collection to delete old cache pages and keep your website updated.
Basic CDN support that will rewrite your website content URLs so that they are loaded with CDN.

Cons of WP Super Cache:

While the interface is pretty user-friendly, it uses technical terms designed for advanced users that may confuse beginners.

Pricing: Free plugin.

Why we chose WP Super Cache: If you are looking for a free caching plugin to speed up your website loading time, then WP Super Cache is a great choice.

For beginners, we recommend taking the time to explore the plugin and understand some of the more technical terms so that you can make the most of it. See our article on how to install and set up WP Super Cache for detailed instructions.

3. W3 Total Cache

If you want to use a WordPress caching plugin with tons of optimization features, then check out W3 Total Cache.

Firstly, W3 Total Cache offers various types of caching besides page caching and browser caching. It also has object caching and database caching, both of which can speed up the execution of dynamic parts of your site (the ones that change frequently), not just the static ones.

Secondly, it has a Google PageSpeed Insights integration. During our testing, we liked that this feature lets you test your website speed without leaving your WordPress admin area, so it’s very user-friendly.

Other than that, you can find other speed enhancement features like CSS and JS file minification, lazy loading, and an image converter from other formats to WebP for better performance.

Pros of W3 Total Cache:

Multiple caching options are available for free: page caching, browser caching, opcode caching, database query caching, and object caching.
Google PageSpeed Insights integration to test website speed.
Image optimization features like lazy loading and WebP conversion.
Pro features in the premium version, like CDN support for the entire website and fragment caching for plugins and themes using the WordPress Transient API.

Cons of W3 Total Cache:

The feature set is comprehensive but can seem intimidating for beginners.
Unlike other plugins on the list, the preloading feature is not available out of the box.

Pricing: Free plugin available. The premium version’s plans start from $99 per year for one website license.

Why we chose W3 Total Cache: The free version of W3 Total Cache offers many caching options that you may not find in other plugins on the list, especially not in the free versions.

That said, the sheer range of features can feel overwhelming for beginners. For detailed setup instructions, see our article on how to install and set up the W3 Total Cache plugin.

4. Sucuri

Sucuri is technically a WordPress firewall plugin, but it has built-in caching options to speed up your website in just a few clicks. We used to use Sucuri on WPBeginner, so we are very familiar with this plugin.

If you run an online store or a membership site, Sucuri recommends using Site Caching, which will keep your cache for up to 180 minutes. Meanwhile, blogs or news portals can use Minimal Caching, which will only cache your pages for up to 8 minutes before they are refreshed.

If you make significant changes to your site, then you can clear your old cache in one click. Sucuri also lets you clear the cache for a file or folder instead of the whole site. This allows you to optimize specific parts of your site without affecting its entirety.

Additionally, Sucuri supports Brotli, a data compression algorithm by Google that is faster than Gzip compression. It’s effective for compressing large files and reducing bandwidth usage. This means people with slow internet can visit your website quicker.

Pros of Sucuri:

Easy-to-use caching features that can be enabled in a few clicks.
User-friendly cache-clearing functions for the entire website and specific files or folders.
Support for compression algorithms, like the more popular Gzip, and a newer option like Brotli.
Reliable CDN service with worldwide network coverage, a great feature for websites with a global audience.
Top-notch security features like a web application firewall, malware removal, and DDoS protection.

Cons of Sucuri:

If you are just looking for a plugin with caching functionality, then Sucuri may seem like overkill.

Pricing: Comes in two types of subscription plans: Website Security Platform and Firewall with CDN. The first starts from $199.99 per year and includes the complete Sucuri security kit. The second starts from $9.99 per month and only comes with a firewall and CDN.

Why we chose Sucuri: If you are looking for a security plugin that doubles as an optimization plugin, then Sucuri is the perfect solution. Besides offering user-friendly caching features, you can get great protection without installing other plugins.

5. Cache Enabler by KeyCDN

Cache Enabler is a free WordPress caching plugin by KeyCDN, one of the most popular WordPress CDN services.

When we first activated the plugin, the plugin page looked rather simple. In reality, it’s quite powerful on its own. You can customize how long cached files last to suit your website needs instead of choosing a time period that’s been set for you.

There are also many cache-clearing settings that you can enable. For example, you can automatically clear the cache when a post type has been published, updated, or trashed so that your blog content stays up-to-date.

Pros of Cache Enabler:

Simple-to-use plugin page interface that’s easy to understand for beginners.
Gzip and Brotli compression support to reduce your file sizes.
Custom post types support, which is great for portfolios, online stores, membership sites, and so on.
A real-time display of your website’s cache size in the WordPress dashboard helps you keep track of how much space your cache is taking on your server.

Cons of Cache Enabler:

Compared to other caching plugins on the list, the features of Cache Enabler can seem pretty limited.

Pricing: Free plugin. However, if you choose to get KeyCDN as well, then the prices start from $0.04 per GB per month for the first 10 TB (for North America/Europe region). The cost varies by region, but you can use its pricing calculator to get estimates.

Why we chose Cache Enabler: As a free caching plugin, Cache Enabler is great at being easy to use yet packed with the most essential caching features. It can be a good option if you just need a simple caching solution.

Bonus Tip: Use Built-in Caching Features From Hosting Providers

These days, many WordPress hosting companies offer their own built-in caching solutions.

The benefit of using these built-in caching settings is that you won’t have to find or install a plugin yourself. Plus, the caching functionality is readily optimized for your hosting, so you may experience fewer errors.

The downside is that the feature set widely varies. Some may only include basic page caching, while others may have more advanced options. Depending on your website, you may not be able to rely solely on these built-in options.

That being said, we still think these hosting caching settings are worth talking about because they are very easy to enable. Let’s look at the caching features offered by some of the most popular web hosting providers on the market.

Bluehost

Bluehost is one of the biggest hosting companies in the world and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider. Their hosting plans include built-in caching that you can enable from your hosting dashboard.

You can select one of these caching levels:

Assets Only – For eCommerce and sites that update frequently or display real-time information, you can use this level to cache your site’s static assets for 5 minutes.
Assets & Web Pages – If you have a WordPress blog, an educational site, or a website that updates at least once a week, consider using this level to cache static assets for 6 hours and other web pages for 5 minutes.
Assets & Web Pages – Extended – For portfolios or websites that update every month or less frequently, you can choose this option to cache static assets for 1 week and web pages for 5 minutes.

If you compare Bluehost’s caching options to the other plugins on the list, they may seem basic. But they also offer a Cloudflare CDN integration to boost your website performance further.

SiteGround

We use SiteGround to power WPBeginner and have seen many performance improvements since we switched. If you are curious, then you can check out our article on why we switched to SiteGround for more information.

By default, SiteGround offers 3 caching solutions: Nginx Direct Delivery for static content, Dynamic Cache, and Memcached (optional).

The last two are caching modules that not many WordPress hosting offers by default, which is what makes SiteGround so powerful. In fact, they can improve your website speed anywhere from 50% to 500%.

For WordPress sites, SiteGround recommends installing their Speed Optimizer plugin to speed up your website by 20%. The plugin can also compress image sizes by up to 85% without losing quality.

Overall, if you use SiteGround, you really won’t need any caching plugins like WP Rocket or others.

Hostinger

Hostinger is one of the fastest-growing WordPress hosting providers in recent years. They are powered by the LiteSpeed Web Server, so their caching settings also come from LiteSpeed.

From the get-go, Hostinger offers two types of caching modules: the LiteSpeed Cache plugin and the Object Cache.

The LiteSpeed Cache plugin is included in all plans and offers page caching, cache preloading, and image compression for your website. By default, Hostinger will update your cache every 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, the Object Cache will cache your database queries and is only available for Business plan users or above. It has been said to improve website speed by up to 3 times.

WP Engine

WP Engine is a managed WordPress hosting company, which means they will take care of most of your back-end maintenance tasks as much as possible. As a result, you won’t have to handle them as much.

Since WP Engine is a more premium hosting service, it comes with tons of caching features by default. These include page caching, CDN caching, object caching, and local browser caching.

You can also set exclusion rules for dynamic content, like shopping cart, checkout, or login pages. If you need to clear your cache, then you can just log in to your user portal and click a few buttons.

What Is the Best Cache Plugin for WordPress?

After comparing the different options on the list, we found that the best WordPress caching plugin is hands down WP Rocket. It has a great balance between being beginner-friendly and powerful to elevate your website performance.

If you are looking for a free caching plugin, then we recommend W3 Total Cache. It has plenty of caching features out of the box, from basic to advanced.

We also recommend checking out the caching modules that hosting providers like Bluehost have to offer. These may already be good enough to speed up your website, and they are already customized to suit your hosting needs.

Best WordPress Caching Plugins: FAQs Answered

Now that we’ve covered the list of best WordPress caching plugins, let’s answer some frequently asked questions.

Do I need a caching plugin?

Yes, we strongly recommend installing a WordPress caching plugin, as it can significantly improve your WordPress site’s speed.

Caching can reduce server load, improve the user experience by reducing load times, and potentially boost your site’s SEO rankings due to improved speed.

However, if your hosting provider offers built-in caching solutions like SiteGround, then you might not need to install a separate caching plugin.

Should I use multiple cache plugins in WordPress?

Using multiple caching plugins simultaneously can lead to conflicts and potential issues with your site. We generally recommend using only one caching plugin to avoid these problems.

However, if you need to use multiple caching tools for specific purposes, make sure they can complement each other and do not result in the same action being performed twice.

Which is better: WP Super Cache or W3 Total Cache?

Both WP Super Cache and W3 Total Cache are highly-rated WordPress caching plugins. However, the choice between the two depends on your specific needs and preferences.

WP Super Cache is a free plugin with some basic and advanced caching features. But some settings require some technical knowledge, so we don’t recommend it if you are a complete beginner.

W3 Total Cache is a freemium plugin with a comprehensive set of caching settings. The abundance of features may intimidate beginners, but the ease of use is generally much better than WP Super Cache.

Check Out More Guides to Speed Up WordPress

We hope this article helped you find the WordPress caching plugin to speed up your website. You may also want to see our list of the best WordPress plugins for business websites, and the best WordPress SEO plugins to help you boost your rankings.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

Disclaimer: We also looked at other WordPress cache plugins and solutions for this article, including WP Fastest Cache, Hummingbird, and WP-Optimize. However, we picked only the very best WordPress caching plugins to help you avoid choice paralysis.

The post 5 Best WordPress Caching Plugins to Speed Up Your Website (2024) first appeared on WPBeginner.

November 17, 2023

How to Stress Test a WordPress Website (2023)

Do you want to know how your site will perform in case of a traffic surge?

Stress testing a WordPress website will show how your website will perform under different situations. This way, you can ensure fast performance and resolve any issues.

In this article, we will show you how to stress test a WordPress website.

What is a WordPress Stress Test?

A WordPress stress test lets you see how your website will perform in high-traffic situations. It helps you prepare for spikes in traffic and see how your site handles the load.

Usually, the amount of traffic a website can withstand is determined by your WordPress hosting plan. However, stress testing helps find these limits and uncovers issues that might occur due to high traffic.

For instance, a sudden spike in traffic can cause your site to crash and utilize all the server resources. Similarly, you can also see which WordPress plugins, themes, code snippets, and images malfunction in extreme conditions.

With stress testing, you can easily fix any issues or correct a setting that might be misconfigured. As a result, you’ll offer a better user experience and be prepared for high-traffic situations.

That said, let’s see how to stress test a WordPress website.

Stress Testing a WordPress Website

When it comes to measuring the performance of your WordPress website, you’ll find lots of speed test tools, like PageSpeed Insights, Pingdom, or GTmetrix.

While these tools help find out how fast your site loads, they don’t tell you how a website will perform under high traffic.

To stress a WordPress site, we’ll be using Loader.io for this tutorial. It is a free tool that simulates high-traffic situations and performs a series of tests.

Sign Up for a Free Loader.io Account

First, you’ll need to visit the Loader.io website and create a free account. Simply click the ‘Sign Up Now’ button to get started.

After that, you will see different pricing plans offered by the tool.

Go ahead and select the ‘Free’ pricing plan.

Next, you can enter details to sign up for a new account.

Loader.io will ask for a company name, email address, and password. Once you’ve added these details, simply check the reCaptcha box and click the ‘Sign Up’ button.

Enter information to create a free loader account

You also receive a verification email. Simply check your inbox and click the link in the email to verify your account.

Adding a New Host to Loader.io

After that, you can set up a target host by clicking the ‘+ New Host’ button.

Next, you’ll need to enter your domain name.

Once that’s done, simply click the ‘Next: Verify’ button.

Next, you will need to verify your domain. You can do this by verifying over HTTP or DNS.

For this tutorial, we will use the ‘Verify over HTTP’ option and download the verification file. Go ahead and click the ‘download’ link and save the file on your computer.

After downloading the file, you’ll need to upload it to your site’s root folder. This is usually called the ‘public_html’ folder.

To upload the file, you can use an FTP client. For more details, please see our guide on how to use FTP to upload files to WordPress.

After uploading the file, you can return to the Loader.io website and click the ‘Verify’ button.

Upon verification, you should see a success message.

Next, you’ll need to click the ‘New Test’ button and set up a stress test for your website.

Configuring Your Stress Test Settings

On the next screen, you can change the settings for your stress test. You can start by adding a name for your test.

After that, you’ll need to select the test type. Loader.io offers 3 test types, which include:

Clients per test – In this, you can test how your site will work when a specific number of visitors visit your site for a specified amount of time. You can set the number of clients and the duration.
Clients per second – This scenario will test your site for a specified number of client requests per second.
Maintain client load – Under this test type, a constant client count is maintained throughout the duration of the test. It stress tests your site when there is a constant load for a specific time.

We would recommend running multiple tests using each of these types. This will help uncover any issues that your site might encounter under different scenarios.

If you scroll down, then you’ll see Client Requests settings. For general testing, we recommend using the default settings and you don’t need to change anything.

Now, you’re ready to stress test your WordPress site. Go ahead and click the ‘Run test’ button.

Analyze Your Stress Test Results

Loader.io will run the stress test for your website and compile the results. You can then analyze them to see how your site performs under high-traffic situations.

For instance, you can start by looking at the average response time. The lower the response time, the faster your website’s loading speed.

In our testing, the average response time was 590 milliseconds or 0.59 seconds when 250 clients visited the site for 1 minute.

This is fairly decent reading and shows that the website didn’t slow down considerably under high load.

However, the maximum response time recorded was 10489 ms or 10.489 seconds. You can now look at the graph below to see when the response time jumps compared to the number of clients.

For instance, our testing showed that there was a spike when the number of clients exceeded 150 and the maximum response time was seen when the number of clients almost reached 200.

Using these insights, you will have a rough idea of how your site will perform when a certain number of people visit it.

You can now repeat this step and run multiple tests using different scenarios. For instance, try increasing the number of clients, testing the duration, and use different test types.

Tips to Improve Response Time & Boost Performance

If WordPress load tests show slow performance under high-traffic situations, then you can try different things to speed up your site.

Here are some tips for improving response time and handling high traffic load:

1. Upgrade Your WordPress Hosting Plan – If you’re using a hosting plan that has limits on the number of visitors per month, then consider upgrading to a higher hosting plan. This way, you’ll get more server resources and your site can handle extra traffic when there is a spike. You can also see our detailed comparison of the fastest WordPress hosting services to learn more.

2. Use a Caching Plugin – A caching plugin reduces the load on your site’s server and helps improve performance. It serves a static version of the site to users instead of going through the entire process of requesting a webpage. As a result, your site loads faster and you provide a better user experience.

3. Set Up a Content Delivery Network (CDN) – A CDN is a network of servers that deliver cached static content to users based on their location. It helps lower the load on your site server and improve the response time.

4. Optimize Your Images and Videos – Unoptimized images can lead to performance issues on your site and increase load on the server. To start, you can compress large image files to lower response time. If you’re hosting videos on your site, then consider uploading them to YouTube or Vimeo and embedding them in your content.

5. Remove Unused Plugins and Themes – If you have WordPress plugins and themes that are not in use or are resource-heavy, then consider removing them. They can slow down your WordPress site by loading unused scripts and utilizing a lot of server resources.

For more tips on improving your site’s performance, please see our guide to boost WordPress Speed and Performance.

We hope this article helped you learn how to stress test a WordPress website. You may also want to see our guide on the most common WordPress errors and how to fix them, and ultimate guide to WordPress SEO.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Stress Test a WordPress Website (2023) first appeared on WPBeginner.

October 6, 2023

How to Reduce Time to First Byte (TTFB) in WordPress – Expert Tips

Do you want to improve your WordPress website’s performance and reduce time to first byte (TTFB)?

When optimizing a WordPress site’s load time, many people overlook the server side. Reducing TTFB (Time To First Byte) will help speed up your site and provide a better user experience.

In this article, we will show you how to reduce TTFB in WordPress.

How to reduce TTFB in WordPress step by step

To help you navigate this post, simply click the links below to jump ahead to your preferred section:

What is Time to First Byte (TTFB)?
Why Reduce TTFB in WordPress?
How to Check TTFB on Your Website
Ensure WordPress, Plugins, and Themes Are Up to Date
Update Your WordPress Site’s PHP Version
Use a Caching WordPress Plugin
Add Content Delivery Network (CDN) to WordPress
Optimize Your WordPress Database
Switch to the Fastest Hosting Service
FAQs About Time to First Byte (TTFB)

What is Time to First Byte (TTFB)?

TTFB, or time to first byte, is the time a server takes to respond to a request and load a web page in the user’s browser.

In simpler terms, TTFB measures the time between a user clicking on a web page and the browser first starts receiving a response from the website server.

The longer it takes for a server to send the first byte of data, the longer it takes a browser to display your website. Several factors go into calculating TTFB. For instance, it takes into account DNS lookup, TLS handshake, SSL connection, and more.

That said, let’s see why it is important to reduce TTFB.

Why Reduce TTFB in WordPress?

Time to first byte is one of the factors that can impact the overall speed of your WordPress site, and it is an important metric to keep an eye on.

TTFB tells the responsiveness of your site’s server, and reducing it will help you provide a better user experience. Your visitors won’t have to wait for web pages to load. In return, it will help boost your conversion, get more leads, and generate sales.

According to research, a 1 second delay in page load time can lead to a 7% drop in conversions, a 16% decrease in customer satisfaction, and an 11% loss in page views.

Besides that, improving the TTFB score can also boost your WordPress SEO.

Google uses what it calls Core Web Vitals to measure performance and overall user experience on a website.

TTFB is not a Core Web Vitals metric, but it can be used for diagnosis purposes. Since it measures how fast a web server responds, you can use TTFB to figure out if something is wrong and impacting the overall Core Web Vitals of your website.

That said, let’s look at different ways to measure time to first byte.

How to Check TTFB on Your Website

You can use different tools and software to check the time to first byte (TTFB) of your WordPress website.

Measure TTFB Using Google PageSpeed Insights

Google PageSpeed Insights is a free tool by Google that analyzes your page speed on mobile and desktop. It gives an overall rating out of 100 and measures Core Web Vitals along with other metrics, including time to first byte.

First, you’ll need to visit the Google PageSpeed Insights website and enter your website URL. After that, simply click the ‘Analyze’ button.

The tool will then analyze your website and show results.

You can then view the time to first byte (TTFB) score and other metrics.

Measure TTFB Using Google Chrome

You can also use your Google Chrome’s developer tools to view the time to first byte.

First, you can right-click on your webpage and go to the ‘Inspect’ option. Alternatively, you can also press Ctrl + Shift + I for Windows or Cmd + Opt + I for Mac on your keyboard to open inspect element tools.

Next, you can switch to the ‘Network’ tab.

After that, simply hover your mouse over the green bars under the Waterfall column.

You now see a popup with different metrics.

Go ahead and note the ‘Waiting for server response’ time, as this will show you the TTFB for your website.

Measure TTFB Using GTmetrix

Another way to measure the TTFB of your WordPress site is by using GTmetrix. It is a free tool that also measures your site speed.

Simply visit the GTmetrix website and enter your site URL. After that, go ahead and click the ‘Analyze’ button.

It will take a few minutes for the tool to analyze your site and show the results.

Next, you can switch to the ‘Waterfall’ tab to view the response time for your web page resources and elements. GTmetrix will show TTFB as ‘Waiting’ in the data.

Expert Tips to Reduce TTFB in WordPress

Now that you know how to measure TTFB, the next step is to lower it and improve the site’s performance.

Let’s look at different steps you can take to reduce time to first byte on your WordPress website.

1. Ensure WordPress, Plugins, and Themes Are Up to Date

When you’re optimizing your site for TTFB and improving overall performance, the easiest thing to do is make sure that you’re running the latest version of WordPress.

Each new WordPress version comes with performance improvements. This could mean optimizing the queries that run code in the database, resolving bugs that would slow down your site, and boosting the overall efficiency of your site.

You can learn more by following our guide on how to safely update WordPress.

Updating WordPress Core From the Dashboard

Similarly, you should also ensure that WordPress plugins and themes are up to date. Just like WordPress, newer versions of plugins and themes can include performance optimization that can speed up your site.

Plus, you should also check if a plugin or theme is slowing down your website and increasing TTFB. You can measure TTFB and run a website speed test by first activating the plugin and then deactivating it to rule out any issues.

If you’re running older versions of plugins and themes and not sure how to update them, then please see our guide on how to properly update WordPress plugins and how to update WordPress themes without losing customization.

2. Update Your WordPress Site’s PHP Version

Updating the PHP version can also significantly improve your site’s performance and lower the time to first byte.

PHP is an open-source programming language on which WordPress is written. Each new version of PHP improves performance by making processes more efficient and reducing memory usage. This reduces the load on your website server when loading web pages.

Getting the PHP version on your WordPress website

Updating the PHP version also helps strengthen your WordPress security. It prevents hackers from exploiting an older PHP version and accessing your website.

You can follow our complete guide on how to update the PHP version in WordPress to learn more.

3. Use a Caching WordPress Plugin

Another simple way to reduce time to the first byte (TTFB) is by using a caching plugin for WordPress.

Caching stores a temporary copy of your web page after the first load that can be accessed quickly upon request. This speeds up the process, as WordPress won’t have to go through all the steps of generating a page. It also lowers server response time and lowers TTFB.

Most WordPress hosting providers offer caching with their hosting plans. However, you can also use standalone caching plugins for WordPress.

For instance, WP Rocket is one of the best caching plugins that is beginner-friendly to use. It automatically optimizes your site to improve performance and offers features like lazy image loading, DNS pre-fetching, and more.

You can also see our guide to improve WordPress speed and performance for more tips.

4. Add Content Delivery Network (CDN) to WordPress

Along with a caching plugin, you can also use a content delivery network (CDN) to reduce the TTFB of your WordPress site.

A CDN is a network of servers that delivers cached content from your websites to a user based on their geographic location.

This speeds up the process of displaying web pages to users that are located far away from your website server. People won’t have to wait for the page request to travel all the way to the server location. Instead, a CDN will instantly show a cached version of that page.

You can see our list of the best WordPress CDN services to choose the most suitable option for your business.

5. Optimize Your WordPress Database

You can also optimize your database and compress website files to lower the time to first byte and improve performance.

If your site’s database contains unnecessary information and hasn’t been cleaned in a while, then it can lower TTFB. For instance, trashed posts, post revisions, and spam comments can sit in the database and impact the TTFB.

You can manually delete these to clear the database or use a WordPress plugin to handle everything for you. To learn more, please see our guide on WordPress database management.

6. Switch to the Fastest Hosting Service

Choosing the right hosting provider for your WordPress website is important. A reputable hosting service is optimized for speed and ensures high performance.

At WPBeginner, we conducted a test to find the fastest hosting service. We used multiple third-party looks like Pingdom, Load Impact (k6), and Bitcatcha to test the performance of each provider.

The results revealed Hostinger to be the fastest hosting service, followed by DreamHost and WP Engine.

You can find all the details in our guide on the fastest WordPress hosting performance test.

FAQs About Time to First Byte (TTFB)

Here are some common questions our users have asked us about the time to first byte (TTFB).

What is a good TTFB?

According to Google Chrome developers, a good TTFB used to be under 0.8 seconds. However, this number depends on the content you have on your page. For instance, a static page would have a lower TTFB compared to a dynamic page.

What is included in TTFB?

TTFB measures the time it takes a user’s browser to receive the first byte of data from the website server. It includes multiple things like DNS lookup, TLS handshake, SSL connection, and more.

How is TTFB measured?

You can use different third-party tools like GTmetrix or Google PageSpeed Insights to measure TTFB. You can also use the dev tools in Google Chrome to view the ‘Waiting for server response’ time and check TTFB.

Why is my TTFB so high?

There can be several reasons for high TTFB. For instance, a slow website server, location of the server, slow DNS response time, content that has a lot of images and videos, and configuration issues can lead to a high TTFB.

We hope this article helped you learn how to reduce TTFB in WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on how to speed up your WooCommerce store and the most common WordPress errors.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Reduce Time to First Byte (TTFB) in WordPress – Expert Tips first appeared on WPBeginner.

June 15, 2022

How to Fix a Slow Loading WordPress Dashboard (Step by Step)

Is your WordPress dashboard loading too slow?

Having a slow loading WordPress dashboard is annoying, and it hurts overall productivity when it comes to creating content and managing your website. Also the underlying cause of a slow WordPress dashboard can also impact your website conversions.

In this article, we’ll show you how to easily fix a slow loading WordPress dashboard, step by step.

Fixing a slow loading WordPress admin area

What Causes a Slow Loading WordPress Dashboard?

A slow loading WordPress dashboard can be caused by a number of reasons, but the most common one is limited server resources.

Most WordPress hosting providers offer a set number of resources for each hosting plan. These resources are enough to run most websites.

However, as your WordPress website grows, you may notice slight performance degradation or slower loading across the board. That’s because more people are now accessing your website and consuming server resources.

For the front end section of your website which is what your visitors likely see, you can easily install a WordPress caching plugin to overcome WordPress speed and performance issues.

However, the WordPress admin area is uncached, so it requires more resources to run at the optimal level.

If your WordPress dashboard has become annoyingly slow, then this means a WordPress plugin, a default setting, or something else on the site is consuming too many resources.

That being said, let’s take a look at how to troubleshoot and fix the slow loading WordPress admin dashboard.

Here is an overview of the steps we’ll cover in this article.

Install WordPress Updates
Update the PHP Version Used by Your Hosting Company
Increase PHP Memory Limit
How to Test Performance of WordPress Admin Area
Monitor WordPress Plugins for Performance
Install a WordPress Caching Plugin
Tweak Admin Screens & Disable WordPress Dashboard Widgets
Fix Slow Loading WooCommerce Dashboard
Block Access to WordPress Admin and Login Pages
Control Autosave Intervals
Switch to Better WordPress Hosting

1. How to Test Performance of WordPress admin area

Before making any changes, it’s important to measure the speed of your WordPress admin area, so you can get an objective measurement of any improvement.

Normally, you can use website speed test tools to check your website’s speed and performance.

However, the WordPress admin area is behind a login screen, so you cannot use the same tools to test it.

Luckily, many modern desktop browsers come with built-in tools to test the performance of any web page you want.

For example, if you’re using Google Chrome, then you can simply go to the WordPress dashboard and open the Inspect tool by right-clicking anywhere on the page.

This will split your browser screen and you will see the Inspect area in the other window either at the bottom or side of your browser window.

Inside the Inspect tool, switch to the Lighthouse tab and click on the Generate Report button.

This will generate a report similar to the Web Vitals report generated by Page Speed Insights.

From here, you can see what’s slowing down your WordPress admin area. For instance, you can see which JavaScript files are taking up more resources and affecting your server’s initial response time.

2. Install WordPress Updates

The core WordPress team works hard on improving performance with each WordPress release.

For instance, the block editor team tests and improves performance in each release. The performance team works on improving speed and performance across the board.

If you are not installing WordPress updates, then you are missing out on these performance improvements.

Similarly, all top WordPress themes and plugins release updates that not only fix bugs but also address performance issues.

To install updates, simply go to Dashboard » Updates page to install any available updates.

For more details, see our guide on how to properly update WordPress (infographic).

3. Update the PHP Version Used by Your Hosting Company

WordPress is developed using an open-source programming language called PHP. At the time of writing this article, WordPress requires at least PHP version 7.4 or greater. The current stable version available for PHP is 8.1.6.

Most WordPress hosting companies maintain the minimum requirements to run WordPress, which means they may not be using the latest PHP version out of the box.

Now, just like WordPress, PHP also releases new versions with significant performance improvements. By using an older version, you are missing that performance boost.

You can view which PHP version is used by your hosting provider by visiting the Tools » Site Health page from your WordPress dashboard and switching to the ‘Info’ tab.

Luckily, all reliable WordPress hosting providers offer an easy way for customers to upgrade their PHP version.

For instance, if you are on Bluehost, then you can simply login to your hosting control panel and click on the Advanced tab in the left column.

From here, you need to click on the MultiPHP Manager icon under the Software section.

On the next page, you need to select your WordPress blog and then select the PHP version that you want to use.

For other hosting companies, see our complete guide on how to update your PHP version in WordPress.

4. Increase PHP Memory Limit

Your web hosting server is like any other computer. It needs memory to efficiently run multiple applications at the same time.

If there is not enough memory available for PHP on your server, then it would slow down your website and may even cause it to crash.

You can check the PHP memory limit by visiting Tools » Site Health page and switching to the Info tab.

You’ll find PHP memory limit under the Server section. If it is less than 500M, then you need to increase it.

You can increase PHP memory limit by simply entering the following line in your wp-config.php file.

define( 'WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '512M' );

For more details, see our article on increasing the PHP memory limit in WordPress.

5. Monitor WordPress Plugins for Performance

Some WordPress plugins may run inside the WordPress admin area. If plugin authors are not careful, their plugins can easily consume too many resources and slow down your WordPress admin area.

One way to find out about such plugins is by installing and activating the Query Monitor plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, the plugin will add a new menu item to your WordPress toolbar.

Clicking on it will show performance results for the page you are currently viewing on your website.

This will bring up the Query Monitor console.

Here you need to switch to ‘Queries by Component’ tab on the left side. From here, you can see the performance impact of plugins and find out which one is taking up too many resources.

You can now temporarily disable the slow plugins and see if that improves performance.

If it does, then you can reach out to plugin author and seek support or find an alternative plugin.

6. Install a WordPress Caching Plugin

WordPress caching plugins not only improve your website speed, but they can also help you fix a slow loading admin dashboard.

A good WordPress caching plugin helps you optimize page load speed, CSS and JavaScript delivery, your WordPress database, and more.

This frees up resources on your WordPress hosting server that your WordPress admin area can utilize for improved performance.

We recommend using WP Rocket. It is the best WordPress caching plugin on the market. It works out of the box and makes it super easy to optimize your WordPress performance.

For more details, see our guide on how to properly install and setup WP Rocket in WordPress.

7. Tweak Admin Screens & Disable WordPress Dashboard Widgets

WordPress automatically loads some widgets on the dashboard screen. This includes Quick Draft, Events and News, Site Health, and more.

Some WordPress plugins add their own widgets to the dashboard screen as well. If you have a lot of these widgets loading on your dashboard, it could slow things down.

You can turn off these widgets by simply clicking on the Screen Options button and unchecking the box next to the widgets.

Screen Options to remove unnecessary widgets

Similarly, you can use the Screen Options menu to show and hide sections on different admin screens.

For instance, you can choose the columns you want to see on the posts screen.

8. Fix Slow WooCommerce Admin Dashboard

If you run an online store using WooCommerce, then there are some specific WooCommerce features that can affect the performance of your WordPress admin area.

For instance, you can turn off the WooCommerce dashboard widget by clicking on the Screen Options menu.

Similarly, you can change the information displayed on the Products page.

After a while, your WooCommerce store may add unnecessary data to your WordPress database.

If you are already using WP Rocket, then you can simply switch to the Database tab under plugin settings. From here, you can delete transients and optimize your WordPress database with a click.

9. Lock WordPress Admin Area and Login Pages

Random hackers and DDoS attacks are common internet nuisances that can affect WordPress websites.

These automated scripts access WordPress login pages and attempt to login hundreds of times in a short amount of time.

They may not be able to gain access to your WordPress website, but they would still be able to slow it down.

One easy way to block these scripts is by locking your WordPress admin directory and login pages.

If you are on Bluehost, then you can simply go to your hosting control panel and switch to the Advanced Tab. From here, you need to click on the Directory Privacy icon.

Next, you need to locate wp-admin directory (usually found inside public_html folder).

Then simply click on the Edit button next to it.

Next, you will be asked to provide a name for your protected directory.

Click on the Save button to continue. The control panel will save your options and you’ll need to click on the Go Back button to continue.

After that, you will need to create username and password for the protected folder.

Now, when you visit your WordPress admin area, you will be prompted to enter username and password.

For more details, see our tutorial on how to password protect the WordPress admin directory.

Password Protect WordPress Login Page

Next, you would want to block access to WordPress login page. For this, you’ll need to manually edit .htaccess file on your website and generate a password file.

First, connect to your WordPress website using an FTP client or the File Manager app inside your hosting control panel.

After that, go to the root folder of your website (the root folder is where you can see the wp-admin, wp-includes, and wp-content folders).

Here you need to create a new file and name it .htpasswd.

Next, you need to visit this online tool to generate a .htpasswd string.

You need to use the same username and password that you used for the WordPress admin directory.

Then click on the Generate button.

The tool will generate a username and password string under the output box.

You need to copy and paste this string inside the .htpasswd file you created earlier.

Next, you need to edit the .htaccess file and copy and paste the following code inside it.

### BEGIN BASIC BLOCK
<Files wp-login.php>
AuthType Basic
AuthName "Protected Folder"
AuthUserFile /home/username/public_html/yourwebsite/.htpasswd
Require user jsmith
Satisfy All
</Files>
### END BASIC BLOCK

Don’t forget to replace jsmith with your own username and change AuthUserFile value with the path to your .htpasswd file. You can find it inside the File Manager app.

You can now visit your WordPress login page to see the password protection in action.

10. Manage WordPress Autosave Intervals

The WordPress block editor comes with built-in autosave feature. It allows you to easily restore your content in case you close the editor without saving your changes.

However, if multiple users are working on your website during peak traffic, then all those autosave requests will slow down WordPress admin area.

Now autosave is a crucial feature and we don’t recommend turning it off. However, you can slow it down to reduce the performance impact.

Simply add the following line to your wp-config.php file.

define( 'AUTOSAVE_INTERVAL', 120 )

This line simply tells WordPress to run autosave once every 2 minutes (120 seconds) instead of 1.

Reduce Heartbeat API Calls

WordPress uses something called the heartbeat API to send Ajax calls to a server without reloading a page. This allows WordPress to show other authors that a post is being edited by another user, and it enables plugin developers to show you notifications in real-time.

By default, the API pings back every 60 seconds. If multiple authors are working on your website at the same time, then these server calls can become resource-intensive.

If you are already using WP Rocket, then it will automatically reduce heartbeat API activity to pingback every 120 seconds.

Reduce Heartbeat API activity using WP Rocket

Alternately, you can also use their standalone plugin called Heartbeat Control to reduce Heartbeat API calls.

We recommend reducing them to at least 120 seconds or more.

11. Upgrade or Switch to Better WordPress Hosting

All WordPress performance issues depend on the infrastructure provided by your WordPress hosting providers.

This limits your ability to improve performance to the resources offered by your hosting provider.

The above tips will certainly help you reduce load on your WordPress server, but it may not be enough for your hosting environment.

To improve performance even more, you can move your WordPress site to a new host and sign up with a different hosting provider.

We recommend using Bluehost, as one of the top WordPress hosting companies. Their shared hosting plans come with built-in caching which improves WordPress performance.

However, as your website grows you may need to upgrade your hosting plan.

High traffic sites would benefit from moving to a managed WordPress hosting platform like WP Engine or SiteGround.

At WPBeginner, we use SiteGround to host our website.

We hope this article helped you learn how to fix a slow loading WordPress dashboard. You may also want to see our complete WordPress security handbook or see our pick of the best WordPress plugins to grow your business.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Fix a Slow Loading WordPress Dashboard (Step by Step) first appeared on WPBeginner.

January 8, 2020

How to Properly Run a Website Speed Test (8 Best Tools)

Do you want to run a website speed test? Most beginners don’t know where to begin and what to look for in their website speed test.

There are a ton of online website speed test tools that you can use. However, all of them present results in a way that it becomes incomprehensible for non-tech savvy users.

In this article, we’ll show you how to properly run a website speed test and the best tools to run your speed tests.

Best Tools to Run a Website Speed Test

There are a lot of free and paid website speed test and performance monitoring tools that you can use. Each one of them has some really cool features that distinguish them.

You don’t need to just test your website with one tool. You can use multiple tools and run multiple tests to be thorough.

However, we recommend users to just use these tools to improve your website performance. Trying to achieve a perfect grade or score on these tools is often extremely difficult and quite impossible in most cases for real-world functioning websites.

Your goal should be to improve your page load speed for your users, so they can enjoy a faster and consistent user experience on your website.

Having said that, let’s take a look at the best tools to run a website speed test.

1. IsItWP Website Speed Test Tool

IsItWP’s free website speed test tool is the most beginner-friendly website speed testing tool. It allows you to quickly check your website performance, run multiple tests, and drill down the results to find out what’s slowing down your website.

You also get improvement suggestions neatly organized. You can click on each category to see the steps you can take to troubleshoot performance issues. The website also offers server uptime monitoring and other useful tools for website owners.

2. Pingdom

Pingdom is one of the most popular website performance monitoring tool. It is easy to use and allows you to select different geographical locations to run a test which is really handy.

The results are presented with an easy to understand overview, which is followed by the detailed report. You get performance improvement suggestions at the top and individual resources as they loaded.

3. Google Pagespeed Insights

Google Pagespeed Insights is a website performance monitoring tool created by Google. It gives you website performance reports for both mobile and desktop views. You can switch between these reports and find some issues that are common among both reports and some that Google recommends being fixed in the mobile view.

You also get detailed recommendations for each issue, which is helpful for developers. However, the tool itself is a bit intimidating for beginners and non-developer users.

4. GTmetrix

GTmetrix is another powerful website speed testing tool. It allows you to test your website using popular tools like pagespeed and YSlow. You can change geographic location and browser by creating an account.

It shows detailed reports with a brief summary of the results. You can switch between the two tools and view recommendations. Clicking on each recommendation will provide you with more details.

5. WebPageTest

WebPageTest tool is another free online speed test tool that you can use. It is a bit more advanced than some other tools on our list. However, it does allow you to choose a browser and geographic location for your tests.

By default, it runs the test 3 times to get your website speed test results. It shows a detailed view of each result which you can click to expand and view the full report.

6. Load Impact

Load Impact is slightly different than other website speed test tools on this list. It allows you to see how your website slows down when more visitors arrive at the same time.

It is a paid service with a limited free test, which allows you to send 25 virtual users within 3 minutes. The paid version allows you to test larger traffic loads. This helps you test website speed test, while also testing how increased traffic affects your website.

7. Uptrends

Uptrends is another free website speed test tool. It allows you to select a geographic region, browser, and switch between mobile and desktop tests.

Results are simple and easy to understand as it also shows your Google pagespeed score in the summary. You can scroll down for details and comb through your resources to understand the performance issues.

8. Byte Check

Byte Check is another free website response time checker. It is made specifically to check TTFB (time to first byte) measurement, which is the time your website takes to deliver the first byte of data back to user’s browser. It is a highly effective way to test how faster your WordPress hosting server is.

You can use any of the tools mentioned above to check your website speed and performance. However, simply running the tests alone would not help you much.

You’ll need to learn how to run these tests properly and use the data to optimize your website.

How to Properly Run a Website Speed Test

Running website speed tests is not guaranteed to tell you exactly how your website performs.

You see, the internet is like a highway. Sometimes there is more traffic or congestion which may slow you down. Other times, everything is clear and you can run through it much quicker.

There are several other factors involved which would affect the quality and accuracy of your results. It is important to run these tests thoroughly before you start analyzing the data.

Let’s see how to properly run a website speed test to get more accurate results.

1. Run Multiple Tests

There are multiple factors that can affect your test. Even though most website speed test tools run over the cloud at the fastest internet speeds, each test would show you slightly different results.

The most important difference you will notice is the time it took to download the complete webpage. We recommend running at least 3 tests to get a more accurate picture.

You can then take out an average result and use it to decide whether or not your website needs improvement.

2. Test from Different Geographic Locations

If most of your customers visit your website from Asia, then testing your website speed using servers located in the USA would not be ideal.

The test results will show you a different user experience than what your actual users are feeling when they visit your website.

This is why you need to use Google Analytics to see where your users are coming from. After that, use that information to select a geographic region for your tests.

For example, if you learned that most of your website users are coming from Europe, then choosing a test server in Germany will give you the closest results.

If your website visitors are from all over the world, then you can run multiple tests to find out how your website performance varies for different regions.

3. Make Sure Your Website Caching is Turned On

Make sure that your website caching is turned on before running the tests. This would allow you to test website caching and how effective it is in improving the performance.

Now the problem is that some caching solutions only store cache when a user requests the page. This means cache takes some time to build and may expire by the time you run the tests.

This is why we recommend WP Rocket. It is the best WordPress caching plugin that lets you setup your WordPress cache with a few clicks and without learning technical stuff.

The best part is that it proactively builds your website cache, which significantly improves your website performance. See our guide on how to set up WordPress cache using WP Rocket for more details.

4. Check the Performance of Your Website Firewall / CDN Service

While WordPress caching plugins can do a lot, they definitely have their limitations. For example, it cannot block DDOS attacks and brute force attempts. It also does nothing against spambots which means your server resources get wasted a lot.

This is where you need Sucuri. It is the best WordPress firewall plugin which improves your server performance by blocking malicious requests.

Now, normally all your website files are served from the same server. You can improve this by adding a CDN service to your website. We recommend using MaxCDN (by StackPath), which is the best CDN solution for beginners.

A CDN service allows you to serve static website files like images, stylesheets, and scripts through a network of servers spread around the globe. This reduces the server load on your website, makes it load faster, and improves user experience for all your users.

Turning on your CDN service and the firewall will improve your test results significantly.

Understanding Website Speed Test Results

The most important parameter that you should look into is the time it takes your website to load.

This is the parameter that affects your users the most. If your website takes longer to load, then users may decide to hit the back button, have a bad impression of your brand, and consider your website of low quality.

If your website is taking longer than 2 seconds to load, then look at the drill-down reports. Find out which resources are taking longer to load.

Usually, these are images, stylesheets, scripts loading from third-party websites, video embeds, and so on. You would want to make sure that those images are served from the cache or your CDN service.

You would also want to pay attention to how long your server takes to respond to each request and how much time time it takes to deliver the first byte.

You would also want to make sure that browser compression (also called gzip compression) is working. This reduces the filesizes between your server and user’s browser by compressing them.

If your page has lots of images and videos, then you may want to consider deferred loading techniques also called lazy loading. This allows content to be loaded when a user scrolls down and only loads the content that is visible on the user’s screen.

As always, you definitely want to make sure your images are optimized for web by using an image compression tool.

The second important parameter you would want to test is the TTFB (time to first byte). If your web server is continuously showing a slower time to the first byte, then you may need to talk with your web hosting company.

All top WordPress hosting companies like Bluehost, SiteGround, and WP Engine have their own caching solutions. Turning on your host’s caching solution may significantly improve TTFB results.

We hope this article helped you learn how to properly run a website speed test and the best tools to run your tests. You may also want to follow our step by step WordPress speed and performance guide to boost your website speed.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Properly Run a Website Speed Test (8 Best Tools) appeared first on WPBeginner.

November 4, 2019

How to Properly Install and Setup WP Rocket in WordPress

Do you want to properly install and setup WP Rocket plugin in WordPress?

WP Rocket is the best WordPress caching plugin in the market because it offers the most comprehensive set of tools to help speed up your website.

However, many beginners are not familiar with the techy lingo and may find it difficult to decide which plugin options they should turn on.

In this tutorial, we will show you how to easily install and setup WP Rocket plugin in WordPress. We will walk you through complete WP Rocket plugin settings, so you can get maximum performance benefits.

Why Use WP Rocket?

No one likes slow websites. In fact, a performance study found that a single second delay in page load time costs 7% less conversions, 11% fewer page views, and 16% decrease in customer satisfaction.

And it’s not just users, search engines like Google also don’t like slow websites. They give a priority to faster websites in search rankings.

This is where WP Rocket comes in.

It is the best WordPress caching plugin on the market and allows you to quickly improve your WordPress website’s speed and performance.

Here is how it works.

WordPress is a dynamic content management system. Every time a user visits your website, WordPress fetches the content from your database, generate a page on the fly, and send it back to the user.

This process takes up WordPress hosting server resources. If a lot of people visit your website at once, then this would slow down your website.

WP Rocket makes WordPress bypass all this.

It crawls and saves a static copy of your pages in the cache and allows WordPress to show the cached page to the user instead of generating a page on the fly.

This frees up server resources on your website and improves overall page load time throughout your website.

We use WP Rocket on many of our own websites including WPForms, OptinMonster, etc.

That being said, let’s take a look at how to easily install and set up WP Rocket on your WordPress website.

Step 1. Installing WP Rocket Plugin in WordPress

The first thing you need to do is install and activate the WP Rocket plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

WP Rocket is a premium plugin, but the best part is that all features are included in their lowest plan.

Once installed and activated, the WP Rocket plugin works out of the box, and it will turn on caching with optimal settings for your website.

We ran speed tests on our demo site before and after installing WP Rocket. The performance improvement was incredible with just out of the box settings.

The performance improvement is instantly noticeable because WP Rocket doesn’t wait for user requests to start caching pages. It proactively crawls your website and preloads pages in the cache.

You can see caching status by visiting WP Rocket dashboard located under Settings » WP Rocket page.

Now that you have installed WP Rocket, let’s take a look at other WP Rocket options and how to set them up to further improve your website speed.

Step 2. Set up Caching Options in WP Rocket

Fist, you need to visit Settings » WP Rocket page and click on the ‘Cache’ tab.

WP Rocket has already enabled page caching by default, but you can tweak the settings to further improve your website speed.

1. Mobile Caching

You’ll notice that mobile caching is turned on by default here. However, we recommend you to check the ‘Separate cache files for mobile devices’ option as well.

This option allows WP Rocket to create separate cache files for mobile users. Checking this option ensures that mobile users get the full cached mobile experience.

2. User Cache

If you run a website where users need to login to your website to access certain features, then you need to check this option.

For example, if you run a WooCommerce store or a membership website, then this option will improve user experience for all logged in users.

3. Cache Lifespan

Cache lifespan is the time you want to store the cached files on your website. The default limit is set to 10 hours which would work for most websites.

However, you can set it to a lower value if you run a very busy site. You can also set it to a higher value if you don’t update your website frequently.

After the lifespan time has passed, WP Rocket will delete the cached files. It will also immediately start preloading the cache with updated content.

Don’t forget to click on the Save Changes button to store your settings.

Step 3. Minifying Files using WP Rocket

WP Rocket enables you to minify static files such as JavaScript and CSS stylesheets. You can simply switch to the File Optimization tab and check the boxes for the file types that you want to be minified.

Minifying static content makes those file sizes smaller. In most cases, this difference is too small to make any noticeable impact on your website’s performance.

However if you run a large traffic site, then this can definitely have a big impact in reducing your overall bandwidth usage and saving on hosting costs.

The one caveat is that minifying files can also have unexpected consequences like files not loading or not working as intended.

If you turn this setting on, then please make sure to thoroughly review your website pages to make sure everything is working as intended.

Step 4. Lazy Load Media to Improve Page Load Speed

Images are often the second heaviest item on a page after video. Images take more time to load than text and increase the overall page download size.

Most popular websites now use a technique called lazy loading to delay image downloads.

Instead of loading all your images at once, lazy loading downloads only the images that will be visible on the user’s screen. This not only makes your pages load fast, but it also feels faster to the user.

WP Rocket comes with a built-in lazy loading feature. You can enable lady loading for images by simply switching to the Media tab on the plugin’s settings page. You can also enable lazy loading for embeds like YouTube videos and iframes.

Note: While lazy loading images will help improve perceived website speed, you should always save and optimize images for web to get maximum results. Here’s how to easily optimize images for web performance (step by step).

Step 5. Fine Tune Preloading in WP Rocket

Next, you can review the preloading settings in WP Rocket by switching to the ‘Preloading’ tab. By default, the plugin starts crawling your homepage and follow links to preload cache.

Alternately, you can tell the plugin to use your XML sitemap to build cache.

You can turn off the preloading feature as well, but we do not recommend that.

Turning off preloading will tell WordPress to only cache pages when they are requested by a user. This means the first user to load that specific page will always see a slow website.

Editors note: Please keep preloading on to get maximum performance results.

Step 6. Set up Advanced Caching Rules

WP Rocket gives you full control over caching. You can switch to the Advanced Rules tab on the settings page to exclude pages that you don’t want to be cached.

You can also exclude cookies, user agents (browsers and device types), and automatically rebuild cache when you update specific pages or posts.

The default settings would work for most websites. If you are unsure about these options, then you need to leave them blank.

This settings area is for developers and power users who need custom settings because they likely have a complex website setup.

Also See: 19 types of websites you can build with WordPress.

Step 7. Performing Database Clean up using WP Rocket

WP Rocket also makes it easy to clean up the WordPress database. It has very little to no effect on your website performance, but you can still review these options if you want to.

You need to switch to the Database tab on the plugin settings page. From here you can delete post revisions, drafts, spam, and trash comments.

We don’t recommend deleting post revisions because they can be really useful in undoing changes to your WordPress posts and pages in the future. You also don’t need to delete spam and trashed comments as WordPress automatically clean them up after 30 days.

Step 8. Configure Your CDN to Work with WP Rocket

Next, you need to switch to the CDN tab. If you are using a CDN service for your WordPress site, then you can set it up to work with WP Rocket.

CDN or content delivery network enables you to serve static files from a network of servers spread across the globe.

This speeds up your website because it allows users browser to download files from the server closest to their location. It also reduces your hosting server load and makes your website more responsive.

For more information, see our guide on why you need a CDN service for your WordPress site.

We use MaxCDN by StackPath on our websites. It is one of the best CDN service for WordPress beginners.

Alternately, you can sign up for Sucuri, which is the best WordPress firewall and security plugin. Sucuri’s cloud-based firewall gives you a powerful CDN service to serve your static files.

If you are looking for a free alternative, then Cloudflare would work as well. However, Cloudflare’s free CDN offers limited protection against DDoS attacks, and the free plan is quite limited in terms of features.

WP Rocket has separate addons to easily set up Sucuri and Cloudflare on your website (more on this later).

Step 9. Reducing Heartbeat API Activity in WordPress with WP Rocket

Heartbeat API allows WordPress to send a periodic request to the hosting server in the background. This allows your website to perform scheduled tasks.

For example, when writing blog posts the editor uses heartbeat API to check connectivity and post changes.

You can click on the Heartbeat API tab to control this feature and reduce the heartbeat API frequency.

We don’t recommend deactivating the Heart Beat API because it offers some very useful features. However you can reduce its frequency to improve performance specially for larger sites.

Step 10. WP Rocket Addons

WP Rocket also comes with some ready to deploy features available as Addons. Let’s take a look at currently available addons on this list.

1. Google Analytics Addon

The Google Analytics add-on for WP Rocket allows you to host Google Analytics code on your own server. This does not have any significant performance improvement but some users want it to get a 100% page speed score.

This feature is compatible with popular Google Analytics plugins like MonsterInsights and ExactMetrics.

2. Facebook Pixel

If you are using the Facebook pixel for user tracking, then this addon will host the pixels locally on your server. Again, this will improve your pagespeed score but may not have any actual impact on website speed.

3. Varnish Addon

If your WordPress hosting company uses Varnish cache, then you need to enable this addon. This will ensure that the Varnish cache is cleared when WP Rocket clears its cache.

4. Cloudflare

If you are using Cloudflare CDN, then you need this addon to make it work alongside WP Rocket. Simply enable the addon and click on the ‘Modify options’ button.

After that, you need to enter your account credentials to connect WP Rocket with your Cloudflare account.

5. Sucuri

If you are using Sucuri, then you need to enable this addon and click on the ‘Modify options’ button. After that, enter your Sucuri account’s API key to connect your account.

Step 11. Managing Your WP Rocket Cache

WP Rocket also makes it easy for admins to manage and clear WordPress cache. Simply go to the plugins settings page, and you’ll find the options to clear WP Rocket cache on the Dashboard tab.

You can also start a preloading sequence to rebuild the cache on demand.

The plugin also makes it easier to import and export plugin settings. You can switch to the tools to easily export and import plugin settings. This is helpful when moving WordPress from local server to a live website and/or when moving WordPress to a new domain.

Below that, you’ll find the option to Rollback plugin to an earlier version. This comes in handy if a WP Rocket update didn’t work as expected.

If you want to have the same rollback feature for all your plugins, then see our guide on how to rollback plugins to older version in WordPress.

WP Rocket FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions

As WP Rocket has grown in popularity, we have answered many questions related to the WP Rocket WordPress caching plugin. Here are some of the top WP Rocket questions:

1. Is WP Rocket free? Is there a free version of WP Rocket available?

No, WP Rocket is a premium WordPress caching plugin. There is no free version or free trial available. They do offer a 14 day money back guarantee.

You may find a nulled version of WP Rocket for free, but we strongly recommend against using those because sometimes hackers use nulled version as a bait to hack your website.

See 9 reasons why you should always avoid nulled version of WordPress themes and plugins.

2. Is WP Rocket worth the price?

Yes it is worth every penny. We are paying customers of WP Rocket and use it successfully on many of our websites including WPForms, OptinMonster, and others.

We also have plans to switch to WP Rocket on WPBeginner in the near future as well. We are closely working with their team to get one particular setting included for it to work on our complex multi-server enterprise hosting setup.

Curious to see what WPBeginner hosting setup looks like? Check out the detailed case study here.

3. Do I need to use WP Rocket with managed WordPress hosting platforms?

The short answer is yes. You can and should use WP Rocket in combination with built-in caching offered by your managed hosting company to unlock additional performance improvements.

A lot of managed WordPress hosting companies like WP Engine, SiteGround, Bluehost, etc have their own caching plugins built in.

WP Rocket plays nicely along those built-in caching options provided by your managed hosting provider while helping you get additional performance benefits with features like CDN, minifying files, lazy loading, smart cache preloading, and more.

4. How to check if WP Rocket is working and caching pages?

To check if WP Rocket is working properly, you need to log out of your site or open it in an incognito window.

Next, you need to open the browser’s source view of the page, and scroll to the bottom. At the very end, you should see a text like: “This website is like a rocket …”

If that text is there, then you know WP Rocket is working properly and caching pages.

5. What makes WP Rocket better than other caching plugins?

In our opinion, WP Rocket is better than other WordPress caching plugins like W3 Total Cache, WP Super Cache, etc because it offers the most comprehensive set of features, and it is regularly updated to keep up with modern browser standards.

This is the #1 reason why we have started switching all of our sites to use WP Rocket, and soon WPBeginner will be using WP Rocket as well.

We hope this guide helped you learn how to install and set up WP Rocket plugin in WordPress. You may also want to see our ultimate guide on how to speed up WordPress, and our list of the must have WordPress plugins.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Properly Install and Setup WP Rocket in WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.