How do I use Google PageSpeed to analyze the performance of my website and understand its metrics and recommendations without being an expert, even if I eventually hire one?
Google PageSpeed Insights is a free tool that analyzes the performance of your website and provides recommendations to improve it. Here's how you can use Google PageSpeed Insights to analyze your website's performance:
- Go to the Google PageSpeed Insights website (https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/).
- Enter your website URL in the search bar and click the “Analyze” button.
- Wait for the scan to complete, then review the results. The results are divided into two sections: “Mobile” and “Desktop”.
To understand the metrics and recommendations provided by Google PageSpeed Insights, here are some key terms and concepts:
- Speed Score: It is a score from 0 to 100 that summarizes the performance of your website. A higher score indicates better performance.
- Optimization Recommendations: They are suggestions to improve the performance of your website. Recommendations fall into two categories: "Should Fix" and "Consider Fix."
- Time to Interactive (TTI): This is the time it takes for your website to become fully interactive and respond to user input.
- First Painting with Content (FCP): It is the time it takes for the first content to appear on the screen when your website loads.
- Larger Content Painting (LCP): This is the time it takes for the largest piece of content to become visible on your website.
- Cumulative Design Displacement (CLS): Measures the visual stability of your website, taking into account how much the layout scrolls during load.
By understanding these metrics and recommendations, you can get a better idea of how your website is performing and make informed decisions about how to improve it. If you need more help optimizing the performance of your website, you can hire a professional web developer to assist you.
