3 More Plugins To Speedup WordPress

Everton | Apr 02, 2009 | View Comments


Because of the expected growth of my new site Windows 7 News, which is already running at over 1m page views a month and the new OS is still only in testing, I’ve been working this week on optimising my WordPress sites to try and make them faster and to reduce the strain on my server.

Ensuring all of my plugins were up to date was my first task. I was quite surprised that when I went direct to the plugin author’s page how many were out of date. I’ve decided that relying on WordPress 2.6+ to tell me that a plugin needs updating isn’t safe, as not all authors remember to update their plugins on the WordPress site.

Going through this process manually also allowed me to really contemplate whether some plugins I’d installed were really necessary. Deleting a few plugins made a big difference, particularly database hogs like Brain’s Latest Comments, and I now just use WordPress’s inbuilt tools to display latest comments. I’d advise checking whether you still ‘need’ plugins every month or so. Also, remember to delete and not just deactivate plugins as some plugins will still take up server resources even when deactivated.

Next, i turned my attention to plugins that would help with my site performance. The three I’ve added are:

  1. Google AJAX Libraries API Plugin: this plugin taps into Google’s Ajax Libraries API, ensuring that all scripts on your site are accessing the latest versions, which usually include performance improvements and bugfixes.
  2. DB Cache plugin: I’ve replaced WP Super Cache with this plugin as it’s faster. It’s quicker becuase it caches queries to the database rather than pages i.e. it operates higher up the food chain. It also means that there are fewer problems when a page’s content changes
  3. WP CSS plugin: This plugin cuts down the size of CSS files and improves page loading times

I’m quite happy with the progress I’ve made so far this week by optimising my plugins. I’ve also made some of the .htaccess changes recommended by this great post. and also  Next week I’ll be hitting the server, so look out for more WordPress optimisation tips.


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About the Author: Everton is based in London and has worked in the internet and mobile space for over ten years now, and before that worked in corporate strategy and consulting. He has a degree in Economics from Cambridge University.He also writes for Windows 7 News, Windows 8 News and One Tip A Day.

  • Nice tips, I have been using WP Super Cache on mine, it doesn't have quite as many issues with pages not updating as it's older sibling but it still can be annoying.
    The CSS one sounds like it will be useful.
  • Speed is what it is all about, as the audience is fickle and will quickly go somewhere else if pages take too long to load. Page load speed is also a factor that affects SEO, so it is important in impressing both humans and algorithms.
  • I use WP Super Cache.  I'm interested as to why you think it delivers a faster response time.  From personal experience the response time does seem to have a positive affect with Google and other search engines.
  • it operates higher up the food chain at the database level rather than caching pages.
  • WP CSS works great, really speeds up your blog load time. A definite install.
  • I currently only use WP CSS plugin out of those three. Will add the rest and see if loading times speed up!
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