Largest Contentful Paint is among the three Core Web Vitals metrics. It measures how long it takes for the largest content element on the screen to become visible during page loading.
Read on to learn more about Largest Contentful Paint.
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What Is Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)?
Users expect websites to load quickly in today’s digital world. We should optimize the performance of our websites to meet user expectations. Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) is among the three Core Web Vitals metrics, and it’s crucial to measure the loading speed of a website.
Google introduced LCP as a website performance monitoring metric. It’s now part of Google’s Core Web Vitals, which includes:
LCP measures the time it takes for the largest content element within the viewport to become visible during page loading, and anything beyond that doesn’t count. The content can be anything, like images, videos, or text. Ideally, LCP should be within the initial 2.5 seconds of a page loading.
LCP is closely related to user experience. Users leave or abandon websites that take too long to load, thus causing an increase in bounce rate.
Note: Google may not show the LCP details for websites that don’t have enough data, as this is a relatively new feature.
Tips to Improve Largest Contentful Paint
Here are the some tips to reduce LCP time:
Optimize Images
One major factor affecting LCP is image size. The larger the image, the higher the LCP. Here’s how to optimize images:
- Use JPEG format as it contains less data and occupies fewer resources than a PNG file. You can also use WebP, a modern image format developed by Google.
- Choose the right dimension for the image to reduce load time. Experts recommend 2400 × 1600 px size for full-width images, as it’s optimized and looks good across all devices.
- Compress the image using tools like TinyPNG to reduce image file size.
Inline Critical CSS and Code Splitting
Critical CSS is a subset of CSS necessary to render a web page’s content at its most basic level. Inline the critical CSS code to make the essential styles load quickly.
Code splitting is breaking down JavaScript code into smaller, manageable chunks that can be loaded and executed on demand. This approach allows you to load only the necessary code for the current page or route, deferring non-critical JavaScript until needed.
Code splitting reduces the initial payload and helps the browser prioritize loading critical resources, such as those affecting LCP.
Minify and Compress Code
Minifying deletes unnecessary characters from the source code without altering its functionality. Usually, developers add white space, line breaks, and comments to make the code more readable to them. However, browsers can load the pages without these characters.
You can manually minify JavaScript, CSS, and HTML files or, much better, use tools. There are separate tools to minify JavaScript, CSS, and HTML. If you use WordPress, tools like Autoptimize and WP Rocket can help you minify codes.
Compression tools can help reduce code size. GZIP compression replaces repeating patterns with shorter representations and reduces the file size without losing any information or functionality. You don’t have to worry about compatibility, as most modern browsers support GZIP.
Pro tip: Reduce unnecessary requests for files to improve LCP.
Server-Side Rendering (SSR) and Static Site Generation (SSG)
Optimize data fetching with SSR or SSG. Efficient code improves the server’s response time, allowing it to render pages faster. Implement server-side caching to store rendered pages in memory or a cache layer. Also, optimize server-side code by reducing database queries and refining algorithms.
For Static Site Generation (SSG), leverage the Incremental Static Regeneration (ISR) feature to generate and update pages on demand. ISR, a key feature of Next.js, allows pages to be updated after the site has been built and deployed. SSG can help save server resources, especially if your website has a lot of pages.
Optimizing the build process is necessary to generate static files. Here’s how to do so:
Additionally, batch requests and parallelization can be used to reduce the time required to fetch data from various sources and APIs.
Pro tip: Use tools like Lighthouse or WebPageTest to measure metrics, identify performance bottlenecks, and make necessary optimizations.
Caching
By caching your website and leveraging Content Delivery Network (CDN), you can reduce latency and improve the delivery of resources, which helps improve LCP.
Configure caching headers in your server to instruct the browser to locally cache static resources like CSS, JavaScript, and images. Setting appropriate cache expiration times allows the browser to save and reuse these resources without making unnecessary server requests. This reduces latency and improves LCP for future visits.
Ensure the browser fetches updated resources when using cache-busting techniques. Common approaches include appending versioning or timestamp parameters to resource URLs and using file hashing.
Utilize server-side caching techniques to cache dynamic content, such as API responses or database queries. By caching frequently accessed data, you reduce the processing time on the server and improve the response time for subsequent requests.
Use the preload and preconnect techniques to initiate the early fetching of critical resources. Preloading lets you specify important resources in the HTML’s <head> section, prompting the browser to fetch them earlier.
Preconnecting establishes early connections to servers hosting the necessary resources required for the page, thus reducing DNS lookup and TCP handshake time.
Content Delivery Network (CDN)
Set up a CDN to distribute your website’s static content across multiple servers globally. By doing so, you can minimize latency, thus improving LCP.
Here’s an example. Assume your website is hosted on a server in New York. If someone visits your website from India, the latency and loading time will be high. However, if you have distributed the static content of your website to a server in India, you can reduce the latency and load time significantly.
Some of the best CDNs include:
The Final Word
Largest Contentful Paint is part of Core Web Vitals and is closely related to user experience. It measures the time it takes for the largest image, video, or text block to load within the viewport. You can improve your LCP by implementing the strategies mentioned in this blog.
If you need help improving the loading speed of your website or with anything related to SEO, get in touch with Lead Nicely. Our pros will thoroughly analyze your website and make the necessary changes to increase your website’s ranking in the search results.
