Best Practices for Faster Page Load Times
People love getting what they want quickly nowadays, and things are no different when they are perusing your site. As such, it is in your best interest to ensure it’s as fast as possible. To help you achieve this, we’ve prepared a guide on web design best practices for faster page load times!
Measure what Google actually scores (Core Web Vitals)
Fast pages are no longer judged by a single “load time” stopwatch. Google’s Core Web Vitals currently emphasize three field metrics: Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), Interaction to Next Paint (INP), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS). INP replaced First Input Delay (FID) on 12 March 2024. Use PageSpeed Insights / CrUX field data for real-user INP—lab scores alone can flatter a site that feels janky on mid-range phones.
Practical order of operations:
- Find the LCP element (often a hero image or H1 block) and optimize that file first.
- Remove or defer parser-blocking JavaScript in the critical path (
deferfor most non-critical scripts). - Stop layout shifts by setting width/height (or aspect-ratio) on images and ads.
- Only then chase micro-optimizations like cookie size.
Google’s Core Web Vitals currently emphasize Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), Interaction to Next Paint (INP), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS). INP replaced First Input Delay (FID) on 12 March 2024. Use PageSpeed Insights / CrUX field data to see real-user INP, not lab scores alone.
Do Not Place Too Many Images, Videos, and Other Similar Elements on Your Pages
Don’t ship more image weight than the page needs. Many product pages use more than five images successfully when each file is properly sized, modern-formatted, and lazy-loaded below the fold. Always optimize and prioritize the main LCP image; lazy-loading that hero image usually hurts performance.
Know how to Optimize Your Image and Video Size, Quality, and Format
Prefer modern still-image formats such as AVIF or WebP, with JPEG/PNG fallbacks via <picture> when needed. PNG is for sharp UI/line art or when lossless/alpha matters; JPEG/WebP/AVIF lossy compression always trades some quality for size—tune quality settings rather than claiming zero quality loss. Use srcset and sizes (or an image CDN) so each device downloads an appropriately sized file. For video, MP4 (H.264/H.265) remains the common web delivery format; avoid shipping huge GIF animations when video is smaller.
Make Sure Your Site is Well-Optimized for All Platforms
Speaking of loading on different platforms, it is incredibly crucial that your site design properly accounts for any devices it might be opened on. Nowadays, if your site works only on a PC and fails to load correctly on a smartphone, or vice versa, you are in serious trouble. That immediately cuts down the audience you can reach. And, as the web design experts from Movers Development point out, it also seriously hurts your SEO score. More often than not, poorly optimized site design loads extremely oddly on platforms it’s not made for. And it takes forever for the pages to load, too.
Try to Avoid Overusing Plugins of All Kinds
Treat every plugin and third-party embed as a performance and security cost. Hosting static assets on a CDN can help; social widgets and heavy page builders often slow pages. Measure before/after with field data.
Look Into Content Delivery Networks
Your site has static design elements which do not necessarily need to be hosted by your original site host services. Therefore, to take advantage of this and speed up loading times, content delivery networks were made. Essentially, they are servers that host some of your site’s content and assist in loading. Note that this means you can’t replace your host with them! The two are meant to work alongside each other. So, you should pay attention to your host from the get-go and select a fast, reliable hosting provider for your site.
Work out Your Site’s Caching
Some website design elements will be constant, no matter what page you open. As such, it is possible to accelerate the loading process by properly implementing caching for these elements. Essentially, caching means the browser ‘saves’ these elements, eliminating the need to load them repeatedly each time a new page opens. That can help you craft the best website even if you pick some harder-to-load elements, so long as you know what you are doing and are savvy about setting up your caching.
Try to Reduce the Size of Your Cookies as Well
Cookies are a way to store some of the data that gets reused between ‘requests,’ or, in other words, the different times you open up the website in question. Typically, this means that cookies speed up how you can interact with the site in question. However, if the cookies grow too big and bloated, this negatively affects your loading times. As such, another of the web design best practices for faster load times is to use cookies but carefully regulate their size and keep them relatively ‘small.’
Optimizing the Way Your Pages Load
Avoid parser-blocking JavaScript in the critical path. Use defer (or carefully used async) for non-critical scripts so HTML parsing and first paint are not stalled. Prioritize the Largest Contentful Paint resource and measure Interaction to Next Paint (INP)—Google’s Core Web Vital for responsiveness since March 2024, replacing First Input Delay (FID).
Ensuring Your Site Always Loads as Quickly as Possible
By using web design best practices for faster page load times, as we outlined, you can speed up your site! And, in turn, you’ll make your site more popular. The only thing to remember is to use them consistently, and you will quickly achieve success.
After you improve speed, work through this essential small-business website checklist for SEO, mobile, and conversion basics.
Last updated: November 9, 2026
Nuno
Nuno Sá Pessoa is an award-winning filmmaker whose films have been shown in more than 200 film festivals and venues from around the globe.
He also has a passion for self-education, self-expression, freedom, privacy, and independence, all of which led to the creation of RushRadar.