Black Friday is just under eight weeks away, and the Christmas season follows right after. For many online shops, clubs, restaurants and small businesses, these are the busiest weeks of the year on their own website. That is exactly when it becomes clear whether a WordPress site loads quickly or whether visitors give up after three seconds of waiting. Studies have shown the same picture for years: every additional second of loading time noticeably costs enquiries and orders, especially on smartphones.

Then there is Google: loading time feeds into how a page is rated through the so-called Core Web Vitals. A slow website therefore loses not only customers but also visibility. The good news: the most effective measures take very little time and can be carried out with the tools already included in your FireStorm web hosting. In this article, we show you six steps to get your WordPress website up to speed before the year-end rush.

Fast loading times help decide whether a visit turns into an enquiry or an order.

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Step 1: Measure instead of guessing

Before changing anything, you should know where your website stands today. Google’s free tool PageSpeed Insights (pagespeed.web.dev) checks an address in about a minute and shows the three Core Web Vitals metrics:

• LCP (Largest Contentful Paint): How long it takes until the largest element, usually a header image, becomes visible. Target: under 2.5 seconds.
• INP (Interaction to Next Paint): How quickly the page responds to a click or input. Target: under 200 milliseconds.
• CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift): How much content jumps around while loading. Target: under 0.1.

Pay particular attention to the result for mobile devices, as that is where most of your visitors are. Besides the home page, also test a typical subpage such as a product or offer page, and note down the values. This way, you can see what each of the following steps has achieved.

Step 2: Use the current PHP version

WordPress is written in PHP, and every new PHP generation runs faster than the previous one. Nevertheless, many websites still run on versions that were discontinued years ago. Switching takes a minute in the Plesk panel: under Websites & Domains, select PHP for your domain and change the version there. PHP versions up to 8.5 are available on our servers, including OPcache, which keeps the compiled program code in memory.

For most current WordPress installations, we recommend PHP 8.4 or 8.5. Very old plugins or themes may no longer be compatible. If you want to play it safe, first use the Clone function in WordPress Toolkit to create a test copy on a subdomain, switch the PHP version there and check the website at your leisure. A side effect not to be underestimated: current PHP versions also receive security updates.

Step 3: Turn on page caching

Without a cache, WordPress rebuilds every page on every request: PHP starts, the database is queried, the theme renders the content. A page cache stores the finished result and delivers it directly on the next visit. This often reduces the server’s response time many times over.

In WordPress Toolkit, you will find the switch for nginx caching for each installation. With it, the web server itself keeps the finished pages ready, without any additional plugin. Alternatively, you can use a proven caching plugin that also offers features such as combining CSS and JavaScript files. The only important thing: use one caching solution, not several at the same time, otherwise they get in each other’s way. After major changes to the website, clear the cache in the Toolkit with a single click.

Step 4: Shrink your images

Images are the largest data item on most websites. A header image straight from a camera or phone can easily be 5 MB or more, yet it may only be displayed at 1200 pixels wide. Three measures make the biggest difference here:

• Upload the right size: Scale images down to the width you actually need before uploading. For most websites, 1600 to 2000 pixels is plenty.
• Use modern formats: WebP and AVIF are significantly smaller than JPEG at the same quality. WordPress supports both formats directly in the media library, and an image optimisation plugin can convert existing images automatically.
• Lazy loading: WordPress only loads images further down the page once they scroll into view. Make sure your theme or a plugin does not disable this feature, and that the header image at the very top is excluded so that the LCP value stays good.

Every second counts, especially at checkout: a fast shop loses fewer customers on the way to the till.

Step 5: Slim down plugins and the database

Every active plugin loads code on every page request, and many also load their own scripts and fonts. Go through your plugin list and remove everything you no longer need. Sliders, social media embeds, statistics plugins and large page builders weigh especially heavily. External fonts, for example from Google Fonts, should be hosted locally: this saves connections to third-party servers and is advisable from a data protection perspective anyway.

The database also grows over the years: every saved revision of a post, expired temporary entries and leftovers from deleted plugins remain behind. If your plan includes SSH access, you can clean up in seconds with WP-CLI:

wp transient delete --expired
wp option list --autoload=on --format=total_bytes
wp config set WP_POST_REVISIONS 10 --raw
wp db optimize

The second command shows how much data WordPress automatically loads from the database on every request. If the value is well above one megabyte, it is worth taking a closer look; usually a plugin is behind it. The third command limits the stored revisions per post to ten. Create a backup before doing this kind of work, either via the Backup Manager in the client area or directly in WordPress Toolkit.

Step 6: Measure again and keep at it

After making the changes, check your website again with PageSpeed Insights and compare the values with your notes. Then test the most important processes by hand: contact form, shopping cart, ordering, login. Aggressive caching or optimisation settings in particular can interfere with individual functions. Ideally, schedule this check as a fixed routine, for example once a quarter, because new plugins, images and content make a website slower again over time.

The right web hosting

All the tools mentioned, i.e. WordPress Toolkit with nginx caching and cloning, PHP up to version 8.5, daily backups and free SSL certificates, are included in every FireStorm web hosting plan. For a fast WordPress website we recommend:

• FireSmall from CHF 5.90 per month: 100 GB storage, 10 databases, ideal for a single business or club website.
• FireLarge from CHF 4.95 per month in the first year (then CHF 8.90): 200 GB storage, unlimited databases, SSH access for WP-CLI. Our recommendation for online shops and multiple websites.
• FirePlus from CHF 10.90 per month: 300 GB storage, priority support with call-back service.

Conclusion

A fast WordPress website is not rocket science. A current PHP version, page caching switched on, properly sized images and a lean plugin list deliver most of the possible gains in the majority of cases, and all in one afternoon. If you complete these steps now, you can head into Black Friday and the Christmas season relaxed, while also benefiting from better rankings on Google.

Would you like to know which PHP version your website uses, or are you unsure how to turn on nginx caching? Our support team will be happy to help. You will find all details about our plans on our web hosting page.

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