8 Reasons Why Your WordPress Site Is Slow (And How to Fix Them Fast)

Why WordPress site is slow

3 seconds — People only stay on a website for 3 seconds and if your WordPress site is slow, they immediately move on to another website. Who loses out? Of course, you. Because when someone comes to your WordPress website, they want something and when they don’t get it or get it late, they get upset and they immediately go to another website to find their content, where they often find it. 

This shows what you lose? A lot of losses. For one, you lose that website traffic (You can check website traffic on a website traffic checker like ahref traffic checker) because this problem is not faced by just one visitor. People don’t come back to your slow WordPress site because it is slow or dead.

When googlebot com or other bots see that people are ignoring your website, they assume that your wordpress performance is poor or your content is not interesting, which is why people are ignoring it. They think that it should be replaced by a good website and not a website with low loading speed. This way you also lose SEO ranking (You can perform your domain ranking check).

When you lose google rank, it is obvious that organic traffic also decreases, and when traffic decreases, then the impressions of Google AdSense ads on the website also decrease. And when impressions decrease, income also decreases. And when income decreases, you become poor.

Why Your WordPress Site Is Slow?

When you find out that your WordPress site is slow, the first question that comes to your mind is why is my WordPress site so slow or why my WordPress website is slow?
So let me tell you, there are many reasons why a website is slow. Page Speed is also one of the SEO problems, which experts consider to be among the top SEO issues, and it is also necessary to solve it.

To solve this problem, first of all you have to look at the WordPress configuration, the website page size and website size, external scripts, and most importantly — choosing the best web hosting.

As easy as all this sounds, it is not so easy in reality, because these are problems that have to be looked at very carefully and examined from every angle. Every small website error cannot be ignored, it also has to be looked at carefully.

1. Bad Web Hosting

You will also understand the rest of the reasons, and one of them is that the most important part of page loading speed is WordPress hosting services. A WordPress website is fast only when the secure web hosting and servers are reliable, because the website depends entirely on the hosting to be strong and fast.

That is why you should always choose the best WordPress hosting that is suitable for WordPress websites and handles the loading properly.

Often people take shared web hosting in the cycle of cheap hosting and regret it later. Shared hosting is usually not fast, because it is cheap for one reason or another — it does not have the features that are in managed web hosting on a dedicated servers. So you should always buy secure and reliable hosting.

There are two main types of hosting: shared web hosting and managed wp hosting.

In shared web hosting, multiple websites are hosted on the same server. Therefore, when one website gets a lot of traffic, it also slows down other websites on the same server. Thus, in shared hosting, each website becomes a burden on each other, and this is also the main reason for the cheapness.

So you should always avoid shared hosting because it will slow down your website and you will lose your organic traffic — all your hard work will be wasted.

Always try to get managed wp hosting because it keeps each website separate, and no other website affects your server, which keeps the website pagespeed at its best.

And the good news is that I have not only brought the problem but also the solution of your problem “Why my WordPress Site is Slow?”— that is, where you can buy hosting and which best web host for WordPress are worth it. I have done the research for you, especially the best WordPress hosting services, which are:

1. BlueHost

2. Kinsta

3. GoDaddy

4. WPEngine

5. Hostinger

2. Issue Created By Plugins

Another reason why your wordpress site is slow is that it slows down due to plugins. Often there are plugins which when outdated, create issues in the website and slow it down, and often the updated version also slows down the website.

 You should keep in mind that before installing any plugin, check its reviews, what people are saying about this plugin, ratings of the plugin, and when was the last update of that plugin. And is there any drawback on it or is it an old plugin. These are the points which cannot be ignored just like that.These also have a big impact on the loading speed of the website. 

Another issue is that you install too many plugins. When there are too many plugins, they take extra loading time and they have different scripts which get executed when the website loads, which slows down the website. So you should also see that you install as few plugins as possible which are necessary and of little use. 

Those which are installed for free and are of no use, deactivate them and then delete them. There is no benefit in keeping them, rather they are harmful. They increase the load time of the website.

 So to avoid this, if ever there is any problem, then you have to note down which action you performed last time or which plugin you installed. After that, deactivate that plugin and the problem will be solved. If not, then deactivate each plugin one by one. Which plugin is creating the issue will be known. 

If the website is slow due to plugins, then also you should deactivate the plugins one by one. Deactivate the unnecessary plugins also. This will not make the website fast completely but it will help to some extent. Among many reasons, this is also often the reason for slowness.

3. Heavy Themes with No Updates

The third reason is that you install heavy themes. Now you must be wondering what is the meaning of heavy themes? Heavy themes are those themes which have a lot of files and scripts. And scripts also have a lot of lines of codes. Apart from this, they have a messy layout. There are too many features and there is something or the other at every place. Due to which the website takes time to load.

If you want to prevent your website from becoming slow, then you have to install a good light weight, well structured theme. You have to turn off the unnecessary features which you do not use. After this, the loading speed of your website will improve to a great extent. Because if the web hosting is good and there are not many plugins then mostly the website becomes slow due to the theme structure and layout.

4. No Caching

Another issue related to this question is caching. Caching is a concept that saves website data for users on their first visit. And when they return to the website, the website loads faster instead of loading the data again.

If you have not installed any cache plugin on your website, nor has your hosting provider provided any cache plugin, then this is also a reason why your website is slow. So, it is necessary to reduce it. If these plugins are not installed, then you can easily install these plugins from the WordPress Plugin Directory with just one click. After just a few clicks, the speed of your website will be much better than before. These are the plugins you need to install:

These are the best plugins you can install to increase your website load speed by up to 97%. Remember to install only one of these plugins. If you install them all at once, your website will become even slower and its features will break.

You may also like to read: Top WordPress Plugins to Boost Website Performance

5. Oversized and Unoptimized Images

Images are a major cause of website loading time. Images are best for a good user experience. However, before uploading, the image size should be correct and the image should be optimized. Cluttered images and unoptimized images also slow down the website significantly. On the other hand, images smaller than the desktop screen size should not be uploaded as they will appear large, and images larger than the mobile screen size should not be uploaded as they also slow down the website.

These are the correct website sizes you should use:

  • Blogpost image: 1200 x 630 px
  • Thumbnail Image: 150 x 150 px
  • WordPress Background: 1920 x 1080 px
  • Featured Image: 1200 x 900 px
  • Logo: 200 x 200 px
  • Header: 1048 x 250

As you already know, this is how you can upload images of a higher size.

Replacing all your old images with these sized images will increase the image size and increase load times, so you’ll need to compress these images. Below, I’m listing these WordPress plugins and sites for compression. You can also optimize your images using these:

1. WordPress Plugins

Here are the best wordpress plugins for image compression:

2. TinyPNG tool

Using this tool you can compress your image.

6. Unused JavaScript and CSS Code

Another reason for website slowness is that there are a lot of unnecessary and unnecessary JavaScript codes and CSS files on your website, which are of no use. These files and codes instead of making your website look good, slow it down and increase the loading time. 

Because every time a website loads, these files are executed first and then the other files. In this way, it takes time to load the real content and visitors run away from your website.

All you have to do is first take a backup of your website and then delete the files which you find unnecessary.

So I have already told you how to catch these fleeing users and how to optimize the load speed of your website by removing or modifying these scripts and CSS files.

7. A Lot of Ads and Pop-Ups

Too many ads and pop-ups can also slow down your website. Because scripts are executed to load these ads and pop-ups. When too many ads and pop-ups are showing, there’s obviously a significant amount of script execution happening in the background, which will slow down the website. 

This also has the disadvantage that they can overshadow content and text, leaving a negative impression on visitors. Sites with too many ads and pop-ups tend to have less traffic. Low traffic also lowers website rankings. Therefore, keep this in mind: avoid having too many ads and pop-ups on your website.

8. Not using HTTP2 Protocol

If your website host supports HTTP2, your website will not be slowed down by HTTPS. If your website is running in HTTPS mode, your web browser will use HTTP2, which is much faster than the older HTTP1.1 protocol.

So, moving from HTTP to HTTPS is beneficial and will optimize your website loading speed.

Final Words

If your website is experiencing speed load issues, there could be several reasons for this. It could be due to poor hosting or outdated plugins. Or it could be that you have installed a bad or heavy theme, which has increased the website load time. Your website can also slow down if you don’t use the caching feature properly. If you don’t use images properly, or you show too many ads to visitors, and you don’t use the HTTP2 protocol, your website will definitely slow down.

Analyze all these problems and then do them step by step, when you fix all these then the website speed will be optimized.

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