How Page Speed Affects SEO And SERP

For years, SEOs have been pointing to the importance of page speed and loading times for search engine optimization. But how important is this ranking factor? What is good load time for Google? What does fast mean? A short loading time, low response time, size of the page or download speed? We have compiled the official information from Google and the results of two of our own studies on the influence of page speed on the ranking.

What does fast mean?

There are a lot of assumptions floating around the internet about when a website is fast. The assumptions range from fast enough for the user to specific times such as no longer than 3 seconds or at least 1.5 seconds. According to the Search Console, the time it takes to download a page over 3 seconds seems to be long. Between 1.5 and 3 seconds as average. According to John Mueller, Google has so far differentiated between slow and fast websites.

In other words, it doesn’t matter whether someone reaches 85 or 100 points in the Page Speed ​​Insights tool. Google employee Gary Illyes made this statement more concrete, at least with regard to mobile. A score of 85 is absolutely sufficient.

Different Types Of Website Performance

Before I go into our research results, it makes sense to consider some possible criteria or key figures for the evaluation of “speed”.

Response Time / First Byte Time

This metric describes, so to speak, the first contact of a person. Browser with the page. Wikipedia:

The time duration from the user making an HTTP request to the first byte of the page being received by the user browser. This time means socket connection time, the time required to send the HTTP request, and the time taken to get the page first byte.

Page Load Time

The loading time or page load time comprises the entire time of the process between an initial request, e.g. clicking on a link, to the finished rendering of the page. But one also finds views in which only the process up to the rendering of the page, i.e. loading the HTML code without taking into account the download or the display of images and loading of Javascript code such as Google Analytics , GTM, etc.

Weight or Size Of The Website

The size or weight of a website describes the number of kilobytes that a website needs to load completely (down). In addition to the sheer weight, the speed of downloading these kilobytes is also interesting.

Correlation Between “Speed” And Ranking According To Google

Maile Ohye emphasizes on the importance of website speed for users and website operators as well as for Google and that Google has therefore introduced page speed as a ranking factor. From the statement that page speed is important for Google, SEOs made the statement over the years that page speed is an important ranking factor. There is no question that landing page optimization is a important ranking factor and there is no question that speed is an important criterion for UX and conversion optimization. But whether the loading time is actually an important ranking factor, as many SEOs claim, remains to be questioned.

The Google Speed ​​Update

Google announced in January 2018 that Page Speed ​​would be a ranking factor in mobile search as part of the Mobile-First Index. The Google Page Speed ​​Update was then rolled out in July 2018. This also made Page Speed ​​a ranking factor for mobile devices. Interestingly, the loading speed also became a quality indicator for the Quality Score for Google AdWords.

The impact on the ranking seems to be just as high as for desktop searches and a distinction is only made between fast and slow websites.

The Speed Update will have an effect on web pages that provide the slowest experience to users and will only influence a small number of queries. It uses the very same criterion to all pages, regardless of the techniques used to design and build the page. The intent of the search query is still an extremely solid signal, so a slow web page may still rank high on SERP if it has fantastic, appropriate web content.

In a webmaster hangout from the beginning of June 2018, however, John Müller stated that with the Mobile Page Speed ​​Update introduced in July they are looking at the loading times a little more differently. You should not only make sure that the Google bot gets the page delivered quickly, but above all the user. According to its own statement, Google also uses real user data from Google Chrome here.

“The blocking of scripts for speed optimization will not help how Googlebot ranks your page.”

Page Speed ​​Insight, GTMetrics or Lighthouse. What is the Right​​Tool?

Google advises webmasters to use a mixture of different tools. Each tool has different target groups. GTMetrics is more of a tool for technicians. Other tools are more for marketers. The results from the Page Speed ​​Insight Tool are something in between.

Content Meaningful Paint (CMP) or Time to Interactive (TTI)

As is so often the case, the question of which metrics should be used to optimize the page speed cannot be answered across the board. The Content Meaningful Paint (CMP) should be used for pages that have the purpose of informing the user with content. On the other hand, the Time to Interactive (TTI) is more recommended for pages on which quick interaction, e.g. playing a video, performing a download or filling out a form.

The Core Web Vitals from Google

From 2021, Google will consider web vitals as factors for the ranking. Various combined signals for the page experience will be included in the ranking.

Core Web Vitals are:

Loading Time. The Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) metric measures the perceived loading speed and marks the point in the page loading timeline at which the main content of the page was likely loaded.

Time To Interactivity. The First Input Delay (FID) metric measures responsiveness and quantifies the experience users have on their first attempt at the page.

Visual Stability. The Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) metric measures the visual stability and quantifies the extent of the unexpected layout shift of the visible page content.

The web vital metrics are integrated in tools such as Google Search Console, Lighthouse and Page Speed ​​Insights and can thus be monitored. The page experience is not more important than high-quality and relevant content.

A good web page experience doesn’t override having great, relevant content. But in some cases pages that have similar content , page experience also becomes important for visibility in search results.

Also Read About: 4 Reliable Solution For Digital Workplace

Is there a connection between Google ranking and the loading time?

The correlation coefficient for the relationship between loading time and Google ranking is rather medium at 0.61 in the top 10 search results. Therefore, a connection cannot be ruled out, but it seems to be rather weak.

How fast do pages load on average and is there a threshold?

What I noticed with the data sets for the various keyword queries is that over 90% of the websites examined loaded faster than 3 seconds. In addition, the average loading time of all websites that were previously measured by Pingdom is currently 3.25 seconds, which would also be consistent with the statements made by John Mueller about fast websites.