Boost Your WordPress Speed: 6 Simple Strategies to Cut Down HTTP Requests

At CanadaCreate, we’ve observed that many WordPress websites face challenges with slow loading times, primarily due to an excessive number of HTTP requests. After extensive testing, we’ve identified effective strategies to minimize these requests and enhance the speed of WordPress sites.

If your WordPress site is loading slowly, you’re not alone. Research indicates that 47% of users expect websites to load in under 2 seconds, and too many HTTP requests are often the main culprit. Fortunately, you don’t need to be a technical expert to resolve this issue.

We have experimented with numerous techniques on hundreds of WordPress sites to discover the best methods for reducing HTTP requests. In this guide, we will share proven strategies that will accelerate your website without causing any issues.

The Importance of Reducing HTTP Requests in WordPress

Have you ever questioned why some websites take a long time to load? Each WordPress page is like a puzzle composed of various elements, including images, CSS files, JavaScript, video embeds, and more. All these components must work together for a page to display correctly.

Think of your browser as a busy waiter making multiple trips to the kitchen to gather each ingredient separately. This process can significantly slow down loading times, especially if your site contains a lot of visuals and features. Each element contributes to the overall loading time.

Additionally, our websites often utilize external resources, such as Google Analytics and social media widgets, in addition to the content stored on the server. While these features can enhance your site’s richness and interactivity, if they are not properly optimized, they can negatively impact your site’s loading speed.

Unoptimized elements can become burdensome, leading to frustration for visitors who expect quick loading times. A slow website can result in delays of just one second, which may cost you conversions, page views, and overall customer satisfaction, as demonstrated by a study from Strange Loop.

This is why minimizing HTTP requests is crucial. As we’ve implemented at CanadaCreate, prioritizing this can greatly improve your site’s speed, enhance user engagement, and ultimately elevate your business. Speed is not merely a technical achievement; it’s a strategic advantage.

How to Identify HTTP Requests

Before we explain how to minimize HTTP requests in WordPress, let’s discuss how you can identify them.

You can easily view the HTTP requests made by your website through your browser’s developer tools. This will provide you with a list of the files that need to be loaded to display the web page.

In Google Chrome, for instance, you can access the developer tools by navigating to View » Developer » InspectRight-click on the page and choose ‘Inspect’ from the context menu.

Next, go to the ‘Network’ tab. Refresh the page to see a comprehensive list of all resources loaded, including both internal and external HTTP requests.

To filter for only external HTTP requests, use the ‘3rd-party requests’ filter. If you’re interested in specific file types that could affect loading times, such as JavaScript (JS) or CSS, use the buttons at the top to narrow down the list.

Be cautious of files that take a long time to load. Check the ‘Time’ column to see the loading duration for each resource. You can click on this column heading to sort the list by loading time, and clicking it again will arrange the slowest-loading files at the top.

In the fourth ‘Initiator’ column, you may see the name of the plugin or theme responsible for loading the file. Take note of any plugins or themes that are linked to slow-loading files.

Consider using third-party tools like Pingdom for a more in-depth analysis. For additional insights, refer to our guide on tracking third-party domain requests in WordPress.

Here are some effective strategies to minimize HTTP requests in WordPress, resulting in faster loading times, enhanced user experience, and improved search engine rankings:

Let’s dive in!

1. Merge CSS and JavaScript Files

To effectively decrease the number of HTTP requests to your website, it’s essential to minimize the number of files that need to be accessed. Combining multiple files can help lower HTTP requests without sacrificing functionality.

For instance, instead of using several CSS files for different sections of your website’s design, you can consolidate them into a single file. This unified file will include all the necessary styling code, allowing the browser to make just one request instead of multiple.

Likewise, you can combine various JavaScript files into one, which reduces the number of requests required to load the interactive features of your site.

There are several WordPress plugins that can help automate this process for you. Popular choices include WP Rocket (premium) and Autoptimize (free).

For comprehensive guidance on utilizing these plugins, refer to our tutorial on resolving render-blocking JavaScript and CSS issues in WordPress.

Along with file combination, these plugins also minify your code. This process eliminates unnecessary characters, such as whitespace and comments, resulting in smaller files without compromising functionality. Consequently, this enhances loading speed by minimizing the data that needs to be downloaded.

2. Implement Lazy Loading for Images and Videos

Lazy loading is an effective method to enhance your website’s loading speed, particularly if your pages feature numerous images or videos.

Typically, WordPress loads all media files before rendering a webpage, even if those images or videos are positioned lower on the page and not immediately visible to the user. This can considerably prolong the initial page load time.

Lazy loading streamlines this process by postponing the loading of images and videos until they are about to enter the user’s view.

These valuable tutorials will guide you on how to implement lazy loading on your WordPress site:

• A Simple Guide to Lazy Loading Images in WordPress
• A Simple Guide to Adding Lazy Loading for Videos in WordPress
• How to Enable Lazy Loading for Gravatars in WordPress Comments

3. Implement a Content Delivery Network (CDN)

Utilizing a Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a highly effective way to enhance your WordPress website’s loading speed, particularly for visitors who are located far from your server.

Unlike the previous strategies, a CDN does not decrease the number of HTTP requests. Instead, it streamlines the management of those requests.

Typically, your website’s files are hosted on a single server, requiring users worldwide to fetch files from that one location. A CDN distributes copies of your website’s files across fast servers globally, delivering them to users from the server nearest to them.

You may want to check out our expert comparison of the top WordPress CDN services to find the best fit for your website.

At CanadaCreate, we utilize Cloudflare to enhance our page loading speed, and you can follow our detailed tutorial on how to set up Cloudflare’s free CDN for WordPress.

4. Utilize Browser Caching

You can also take advantage of browser caching to minimize HTTP requests to your website, especially for returning users who visit your site frequently.

When users first access your website, their browser retrieves all essential resources, including images, stylesheets, and JavaScript files. Browser caching enables the storage of these files locally on the user’s device.

On subsequent visits, the browser checks its local cache before sending HTTP requests to your server. If it finds a valid copy of a file in the cache, it will use that local version instead of downloading it again.

This process significantly decreases the number of HTTP requests sent to your server, leading to faster loading times for returning users.

However, if your website content changes frequently, it’s crucial to set proper expiration times for cached resources. This ensures that users eventually receive the most up-to-date versions of your files.

You can manage the caching duration of resources by adding Expires headers in WordPress. These headers inform the browser when a cached file should be deemed outdated and needs to be re-downloaded from your server.

5. Reduce the Use of External Resources

Many WordPress plugins and themes load resources such as scripts, stylesheets, and images from external sources, including Google Analytics, Facebook, and font providers.

External HTTP requests can negatively affect your website’s loading speed, as the browser must connect to multiple servers to retrieve all necessary elements.

Even if these external resources are optimized for speed, having too many can hinder your website’s overall performance.

To minimize external HTTP requests, begin by deactivating and removing any plugins and themes that you do not need.

Consider looking for alternatives to any plugins or themes that rely on slow-loading files, which you may have identified when reviewing HTTP requests.

When selecting WordPress plugins, pay attention to the external resources they utilize. Choose plugins that focus on performance and avoid those that load excessive external scripts or styles.

For better control over your plugins, think about using a plugin management tool like Plugin Organizer. This enables you to load plugins selectively on the specific pages where they are required.

Custom web fonts are frequently loaded from external sources, such as Google Fonts, and can greatly increase HTTP requests. Limit the number of font families and weights you use, or consider using system fonts that are already available on users’ devices.

At CanadaCreate, we transitioned to using system fonts in 2021, which significantly enhanced our page load speeds, particularly for users on slower internet connections. Discover how to implement this change in our guide on disabling Google Fonts on your WordPress site.

6. Bonus Tip: Activate Gzip Compression

A final recommendation is to enable GZIP compression, which helps minimize the file sizes on your web server.

Although this doesn’t directly decrease the number of HTTP requests, it accelerates the loading process and facilitates quicker file transfers for your website.

Expert Resources for Enhancing WordPress Performance

We hope this guide has assisted you in learning how to minimize HTTP requests in WordPress. You might also find our other resources on improving WordPress performance helpful:

• Why Is My WordPress Site Slow? Discover Solutions with Our 11 Expert Tips
• How to Optimize Images for Web Performance While Maintaining Quality
• Beginner’s Guide to Enhancing Website Speed with Fast PHP & MySQL
• Step-by-Step Guide to Conducting an Effective Website Speed Test
• Comprehensive Guide to Stress Testing Your WordPress Website
• 8 Expert Tips to Prevent Large Network Payloads in WordPress
• Using the GTmetrix Plugin to Optimize Your WordPress Site Performance

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