Site speed is a crucial metric for SEO. Google’s Page Speed Insights tool has been used by millions of people, but the data set isn’t always useful. This article will show you how to use the tool correctly and get valuable insights from it that can help boost your web presence.
“gtmetrix” is a free tool that allows users to check their website’s Google Page Speed Insights. It provides an overview of the site’s SEO and gives suggestions on how to improve it.
Google’s New Page Speed Insights User Interface
Users of Google’s PageSpeed Insights weren’t always aware of the context of the information they were given. You may be one of these people if you’re new to search engine optimization (SEO). Fortunately for us, Google has taken the effort to solve the issue and has made adjustments to the tool to make data simpler to analyze and comprehend.
Google announced the Core Web Vitals as a read-out for its tool in May 2021. Since then, they’ve been a ranking element.
If URL-level field data for the Core Web Vitals was available at the time, it was shown. If that wasn’t possible, lab data was utilized instead. The PageSpeed rating (seen above as “43”) was at the top of the tool’s rankings. Visually, the PageSpeed rating was still emphasized as the most essential measure, with the Core Web Vitals acting as add-ons.
The PageSpeed rating score remained still the major emphasis of the basic Web Vitals data, which was quite top-line. There seems to have been a fundamental change in emphasis with the new layout:
The Core Web Vitals measurements have been raised higher in the new style and given an overall description; in this example, “Core Web Vitals Assessment: Failed.”
Expanded Core Web Vitals
The Core Web Vitals are not only more visible, but they may also be expanded:
According to Google’s attempted page loads, the expansion boxes provide comprehensive information. When you use Google’s PageSpeed Insights to examine a website, it takes substantially longer than when you open the page in a browser tab. This is because while creating PageSpeed results, Google tries to load the same page many times.
The Core Web Vital named Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) is sluggish for the page in our sample, with 51 percent of page loads in the excellent area, 31 percent in the “needs improvement” category, and 18 percent in the bad range. This indicates that LCP is only met around half of the time for this page (and thus the page fails the test).
Toggle Lab Data Prominence and Origin Data
Lab data seems to have been taken from the top of the interface. Unlike the previous version of the program, no lab data is supplied as a replacement at the top of the read-out if a page lacks adequate “real-world” data:
However, if you scroll down the tool’s read-out, you may still get approximated lab data (along with the related PageSpeed rating):
There’s a new “Origin” toggle towards the top of the page:
This enables you to access “origin” data rather than data that is connected to the checked URL. Origin-level data is an average of all data gathered for all pages on a single website — not just the page in question, but the whole website!
Toggling between “This URL” and “Origin” may rapidly assist a webmaster determine if a certain URL is doing better, worse, or in the middle of the site’s other pages (from a Core Web Vitals perspective).
In certain cases, if there isn’t enough URL data, Google’s PageSpeed Insights will fall back to origin-level data. Google will display the “No data found” warning if there is insufficient real-world URL-level and origin-level data, as previously described. Simply scroll down to where the tool states “Values are approximated and may vary” in this case. There’s a little “METRICS” heading underneath that, which represents Google’s simulated lab data.
If real-world field data is unavailable, you may still utilize Google’s projected data. This is likely for low-traffic sites, since the “No data detected” error will appear at the top of the tool’s report. The CrUX report provides the majority of Google’s real-world field data. This information comes from Chrome users who “opted-in to synchronizing their browser history, have not set up a Sync pass, and have use statistic reporting enabled,” according to Google. Because this plainly does not apply to everyone, traffic must reach a particular peak before field data can be obtained.
So, what’s different now?
The page’s design has been changed, and the tool now seems to be lot more polished. But, in terms of changes that SEO professionals should be concerned about, these are some we’ve seen thus far:
- The PageSpeed rating (which is a numeric read-out) has been moved to the estimated metrics section. This indicates that the total page speed ranking is less relevant, yet it’s crucial to realize that it still matters to some degree.
- Martin Splitt of Google debunks several SEO fallacies about PageSpeed in this video. He claims that the PageSpeed ranking is still significant, but not in a granular sense. For example, if your rating improves from yellow or orange (average) to green (excellent), your page’s Google ranks are likely to improve somewhat. Although content is still king, if two sites have equally excellent content but one has a quicker page speed, that page is more likely to rank higher than the other. If your PageSpeed rating rises from 90 to 95 (excellent), don’t expect to notice any improvements in your ranking.
- PageSpeed optimization relies heavily on core web vitals. If real-world field data indicates that the Core Web Vitals evaluation “failed,” that will be your primary problem and concern.
- Field data is now much more visible and, as a result, far more significant than lab data. If the lab data indicates that your page is OK and that your page performance is average, but the field data indicates that things aren’t so good and that your “Core Web Vitals Assessment” has “failed,” something has to be done.
- If there isn’t enough URL-level field data, field data now has access to origin-level data, which may be defaulted to. You may still browse to the origin-level field data if there is adequate URL-level field data. This allows performance analyzers to compare the performance of particular URLs (for Core Web Vitals) to the site’s average norm.
- Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool may be used to augment Core Web Vitals measurements to indicate performance throughout various page loads.
From Google’s perspective, there have been a number of fascinating developments. After Google’s latest algorithm improvements, rearranging the user experience (UX) to prioritize Core Web Vitals makes perfect sense. It’s fantastic to be able to see statistics per page load while viewing particular Core Web Vitals metrics. The newly available origin-level data for field data, in particular, is a welcome addition. There was previously a “origin summary,” but it wasn’t very informative.
That’s all there is to it! We continue to stay watchful and analyze these changes when Google overhauls its tools and accompanying interfaces.
The “pingdom speed test” is a free tool that allows users to check their website’s performance. Pingdom offers an SEO overview of the site and helps with optimization.
Frequently Asked Questions
How does Google Page Speed Insights work?
A: Google Page Speed Insights is a website that checks, in real time, how fast your website loads. It also tells you what pages are slow and why theyre slow.
How do you read Google speed insights?
A: The Google speed insights tool is a very simple way to measure the latency and download/upload speeds of your internet connection. To read it, all you need to do is type Google speed insights into a search engine, followed by the URL of your computers homepage or favorite website.
Is Google Page Speed Insights accurate?
A: Yes, Google Page Speed Insights is accurate. It can measure website load times and ping time from a server to determine how quickly your site loads for the visitor.
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