Website speed is not a number to brag about; it is an experience the visitor feels in the first two seconds. The good news is that most slowness comes from a few repeating causes you can check before launch.
01Start by measuring
Before any optimisation, measure where you are. A tool like Lighthouse in Chrome gives a quick picture and focuses on three indicators of user experience: LCP (how fast the largest element appears), INP (how quickly the page responds to interaction), and CLS (layout stability, so nothing jumps while loading). Test on a real phone too; a desktop hides many problems.
02Images: usually the biggest weight
- Change the format: WebP or AVIF is much smaller than PNG for the same quality in most images.
- Change the size: do not upload a 3000 px image to display at 400 px.
- Set dimensions: specifying width and height stops the page jumping when the image appears.
- Defer what is below the fold: distant images do not need to load immediately (
loading="lazy").
03Fonts
Arabic fonts are usually heavier than Latin ones. Load only the weights you use, host them on your own site instead of an external service when you can, and use font-display: swap so text shows at once in a fallback font instead of the page waiting blank.
04JavaScript
Every script you load has to be parsed and run on the visitor's device, and mid-range phones suffer first. Review the libraries and tracking tools you add, remove what you do not use, and defer what is not needed for the first view.
05The takeaway
Measure, then fix images, then fonts, then scripts, and measure again. A site with a little less on it opens faster, costs less to host, and is liked by visitors and search engines alike.
