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In 2023, American consumers purchased $1.24 trillion in products and services sold online. Economists estimate that between 2024 and 2028, U.S. online sales could increase by as much as 68%. That converts to an annual increase of nearly 14%. Globally, online sales could increase by more than a whopping 68% over the next three years!
People enjoy buying stuff online because it's convenient, fun, and faster than driving to a brick-and-mortar store. When they visit a Shopify store or other e-commerce platform, they anticipate a pleasant, stress-free shopping experience, browsing and buying items from the comfort of their homes.
If your Shopify store conversion rates and sales have mysteriously dropped, and you can't figure out why, this optimization guide is just for you. Keep reading to get answers to the question that has been keeping you up at night--why is my Shopify store so slow?
Common Causes of Slow Shopify Stores
A slow-loading Shopify website will ultimately drive customers into the digital arms of competing e-commerce platforms. Check out these statistics about conversion rates and page speed:
- E-commerce websites that load within one second convert nearly three times more visitors than e-commerce sites that take 5 seconds to load.
- B2B websites that load in one second have conversion rates five times higher than B2B sites that take 10 seconds to load.
- Around half of users report abandoning a website if it doesn't load in under 2 seconds.
Finding ways to speed up your Shopify store's loading time is vital to avoid the risk of losing potential customers to your top competitors. Let's go through common reasons for a slow load time:
- Heavy Image and Unoptimized Media – High-resolution images and poorly compressed videos require extra bandwidth, which delays loading speeds and frustrates visitors.
- Too Many Apps Installed – Excessive use of apps hinders browser loading times because they bog down the site with additional resources and scripts.
- Overloaded Themes with Excessive or Unnecessary Code – Browsers need more time to interpret and display website pages cluttered with excessive or redundant code. This may slow loading times by as much as 10 seconds.
- Large JavaScript and CSS Files – Browsers must download, interpret, and execute JavaScript and CSS files before loading pages, which generally lengthens website load times.
- Unoptimized External Scripts – Inefficient external scripts must be retrieved from separate servers before pages can load. In addition, unoptimized external scripts may contain poor or botched code that further delays loading times.
How to Diagnose Performance Issues
Have customers fled your Shopify store like a crime scene, and you don’t know why? It’s time to investigate your performance issues.
Use Shopify's Native Speed Tool
Shopify Speed Insights is the company's native speed tool. It analyzes your store's load times and overall performance, and offers suggestions for improving loading speed.
Utilize Google PageSpeed Insights
PageSpeed Insights is a free online tool that analyzes the performance of individual web pages and provides suggestions about optimizing images, improving code readability, and increasing server response times.
Leverage GTMetric and Lighthouse
GTmetrix and Lighthouse are both tools used to analyze website performance. GTmetrix evaluates webpage efficiency and offers suggestions for enhancing page speed and server response times. Lighthouse is an open-source tool that audits web pages for performance, accessibility, and SEO practices.
Review Shopify Analytics and Speed Reports
Shopify Analytics provides data about your store's sales data, conversion rates, and marketing campaign effectiveness. Shopify Speed Reports evaluates your store's page load times to identify problem areas and offer suggestions to eliminate these areas.
Get in touch
with our expert
Discuss your project requirements and get a free estimate.
Get in touch
with our expert
Discuss your project requirements and get a free estimate.
Best Practices for Speed Optimization
Once you have measured your current performance data, it’s time to move on to hands-on improvements. Let’s review the most effective ones.
Optimize Images and Compress Files
Lossy compression removes redundant data from images to reduce the file size but may produce some loss of picture quality. WebP and JPEG are popular compression formats.
Lossless compression compresses the image without loss of quality. Typically used for images that require high fidelity, lossless compression formats include PNG and GIF.
Minify CSS, JavaScript, and HTML
To improve loading time, try reducing the size of these files by removing whitespace, code comments, and nonessential characters.
Leverage Lazy Loading for Images
Enable lazy loading to delay loading scripts, images, and other unnecessary content until visitors need them. Users can then scroll down a page and interact only on demand, with elements requiring more resources.
Having more than one large image may delay loading times due to transferring excessive data, depleting CPU, memory, and other device resources, and contributing to network congestion.
Reduce HTTP Requests
Speed up your Shopify store by combining multiple files into minimal requests, decreasing the number of external scripts, and optimizing CSS sprites simultaneously.
Implement a Content Delivery Network (CDN)
A CDN can distribute your Shopify website across different servers worldwide, allowing users to enjoy faster loading times from servers closest to their location.
Avoid Redirects and Fix Broken Links
To avoid slow-loading pages and improve user experience, minimize the number of redirects and ensure all links are working correctly.
Shopify Theme Optimization Tips
Optimizing your Shopify visuals is a separate chapter in your performance optimization process. Here are some recommendations to follow.
Choose a Lightweight Theme
Here's where the adage “less is better” is handy to remember. Select themes with static images and minimal code to increase website loading times. Replace GIFs and animations with stationary images to reduce load times in heavyweight themes.
Ensure Mobile Responsiveness
With millions of people using their phones exclusively to purchase products online, remember to use responsive design techniques such as flexible grids, fluid images, and CSS media queries when developing your Shopify website.
Optimize Product Pages and Collection Pages
Embed high-quality, compressed images, eliminate unnecessary scripts, and take advantage of Shopify's built-in optimization features to increase product and collection page loading times.
Use System Fonts Where Possible
Using custom fonts means your browser must download and process fonts before displaying actual content. This can increase the number of HTTP requests and delay page loading. Pre-installed system fonts eliminate the need for browsers to acquire additional resources, thus enhancing page performance and conversion rates.
Advanced Shopify Store Speed Optimizations
Finally, let’s go over the more complicated steps you can take to speed up your Shopify. For these actions, you most likely need to reach out to Shopify experts for skilled assistance.
Implement Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)
AMP helps create faster-loading web pages accessed on phones, offering straightforward guidelines for improving the performance and speed of mobile websites.
Enable Browser Caching
Instructing browsers to store static images and CSS files locally eliminates the need to download them repeatedly, which can lengthen page loading times.
Preload Key Assets
Determine which elements are necessary for displaying site pages and load them proactively. JavaScript has a preload attribute that designates which elements, such as scripts, images, or fonts, should be preloaded. You can use Shopify tools to optimize element loading or have a CDN preload key assets.
Reduce Server Response Time
Streamline database queries, server configurations, and code to increase the loading time of your online store website.
Upgrade Shopify Hosting Plan for Better Performance
Shopify offers four hosting plans to accommodate your store's overall performance and analytical needs.
FAQs
How do I check the speed of my Shopify store?
Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, and Shopify's built-in Speed Insights can assess your Shopify store's loading speed, identify issues, and suggest ways to improve performance.
What is a good loading time for a Shopify store?
If your Shopify store pages load within two seconds, you're good to go! If they take longer to load, contact Transform Agency for an in-depth evaluation of page performance.
Can too many Shopify apps slow down my store?
Yes, excessive app use will slow down your store. Unnecessary API calls from apps can cause lags in loading times, especially poorly developed apps dealing with slow-to-respond external servers. A professional app developer understands how to create apps that do not interfere with page performance.
How often should I optimize my Shopify store for speed?
Perform monthly speed audits and consistently optimize your store for speed with GTmetrix, Google PageSpeed Insights, and other similar tools.
How Transform Agency Can Boost Your Shopify Performance?
Transform Agency, a professional e-commerce web development firm with clients worldwide, can boost your Shopify online store conversion rates by analyzing your website's metrics, identifying all issues affecting website loading speed, and reinventing performance to give your customers the most seamless shopping experience possible.
Don't let slow load times and low conversion rates prevent you from achieving continued success with your Shopify store. Contact us today to speak to a Transform Agency team member.
Written with the assistance of Sergey G.
Adobe Commerce Business Practitioner | Certified PSM & PSPO at TA
Sergey ensures project success by validating business cases, defining success metrics, and identifying sustainable benefits. His proactive approach leverages existing systems, processes, and data to deliver additional value. Serge excels in planning, executing, monitoring, and controlling all aspects of the project lifecycle, ensuring meticulous attention to detail and strategic oversight.
Sergey ensures project success by validating business cases, defining success metrics, and identifying sustainable benefits. His proactive approach leverages existing systems, processes, and data to deliver additional value. Serge excels in planning, executing, monitoring, and controlling all aspects of the project lifecycle, ensuring meticulous attention to detail and strategic oversight.
