Testing your site’s speed is a common practice for publishers and a useful way to determine what elements are influencing the load time of your site. We all know that fast-loading sites = happy readers, so site speed matters! Along with that, site speed tests matter as well. Below are a few of the most common site speed tests that are available, ranked by how Monumetric would recommend them. Happy testing! 🙂
#1 – Google PageSpeed Insights:
This is the page speed test we prefer the most here at Monumetric. For years it has been a popular go-to tool for testing and grading a website, and for good reason. It’s a simple tool created by Google that benchmarks websites and grades them on a scale of 1 to 100 for both mobile and desktop. The higher the number, the faster the site is. This test gives detailed information about things like render-blocking code, Time to First Byte (TTFB,) page sizes, and more. Under each section, you’ll be given a list of recommended paths of action that if taken, should speed up your website. It is completely free to use and doesn’t require registration. Monumetric puts Google PageSpeed Insights as #1 on our list and is the test we use for tracking site speed trends across the network.
#2 – GTmetrix:
GTmetrix allows you to get detailed information on your page speed, timings, performance score, and more. It also provides information on how you can fix the issues that were exposed by the test. If you register for an account (free) you can choose your location, different browsers, and even the connection type. The user interface can be a little bit confusing, but if you’re looking for more detailed customization, GTmetrix might be useful for you.
#3 – Pingdom:
Pingdom is another well-known website speed test that has been around for ages. It requires no login to use and the reports are less detailed than those you’d get from Google PageSpeed Insights. The site’s performance is graded from 0 to 100 and then has a breakdown of the response codes, content size, request types, requests by domain, and a waterfall chart that lets you see details on your files’ load times. The reports can be a little tedious to study, and it requires a lot of digging to get the most out of the results.