How To Improve Core Web Vitals – Simple Steps To Success

How To Improve Core Web Vitals?

The Core Web Vitals are among the important ranking factors for Google to determine the performance of a website. It is likely that you are negatively affecting the user experience (UX) if the vitals are not improved. 

What are Core Web Vitals?

Core web Vitals measure the website’s loading performance, visual stability and interactivity. The largest contentful paint (LCP) measures a website’s loading performance. A good LCP is one that has a time of 2.5 seconds or below.

The ‘Cumulative Layout Shift’ (CLS) measures visual stability. 0.1 or less is seen as a good CLS for a webpage. The ‘First Input Delay’ (FID) measures the interactivity of a webpage. The user experience of a webpage can be said to be good if the time to load is 100 milliseconds or less. 

To measure your website’s Core Web Vitals, you can use PageSpeed Insights, Google Search Console and many other free online tools. Both desktop and mobile versions are available for viewing insights. The following are examples of Core Web Vitals results from PageSpeed Insights and Google Search Console:

Core Web Vitals need to be improved for both mobile and desktop versions to increase the chances of better search engine visibility. Below is an image showing the issues listed through Google Search Console. For Core Web Vitals to improve, such issues need to be resolved.

Step 1: Image Optimisation Impacting LCP

To improve LCP, you can compress the images and reduce their size to make them load faster. Online tools are available that can help you reduce the image size without compromising the image’s quality.

While uploading the images, you should make sure that they are of an appropriate size, and should not take up excessive space. Image dimensions are automatically assigned by the Content Management System (CMS) when images are uploaded. Accepting these dimensions or using a smaller size is better.

You must define the dimensions of an image when adding it manually, keeping in mind that large images occupy more space is important.

Step 2: Lazy Loading Images Impacting LCP

Another way to improve the LCP score is to implement lazy loading images. When this is implemented, images on the page are loaded when the user scrolls to that particular section. When lazy image loading isn’t implemented, the images on the page load all at once when a user visits the page. As a result, the LCP score is affected negatively.

Step 3: Using Different Images for Mobile and Desktop Impacting LCP

LCP scores can also be improved by using different sizes of the same images for mobile and desktop versions. Using this process will produce the right image size for the right screen size, which will help speed up loading time.

Step 4: Including Image Size Attributes Impacting CLS

If image size attributes are included, a certain amount of space is left for the image to load once the user scrolls to the relevant section. This prevents visual shifts and improves page loading speed.

Step 5: Increasing the Server Size Impacting FID and LCP

Servers that host your website need to be fast. This will make the website load faster. Check if you can upgrade your hosting plan or increase the server’s capacity if you think the server is too slow. High-speed servers will improve both LCP and FID.

Step 6: Eliminating Unwanted CSS and JavaScript Impacting FID and LCP

There are codes that are never used and still happen to be on the website. You might find such codes in JS or CSS files. During the loading of a page, these unnecessary codes are also read completely, increasing loading time and negatively impacting both FID and LCP.

It is possible to remove these unwanted codes manually as well as using tools. Many online tools are available online that can assist with this process.

Improve Core Web Vitals With The Help of Reposition

Your website’s Core Web Vitals can be improved in many other ways besides those listed above. Every website is different and there are different areas that need to be improved depending on the score of the Core Web Vitals.

It can seem difficult to improve Core Web Vitals because it is more technical. Reposition can help you solve the problem by improving the technical side of your website if you are experiencing the same issue. Reach out to us today for expert advice on Core Web Vitals.