WP Pirates

Service Pillar 3 of 4

Performance Solutions

Get into Core Web Vitals 'Good' and stay there. LCP, INP, CLS — all of it, on real WordPress sites.

Where most WordPress sites bleed speed

After auditing a lot of WordPress sites, the same five issues account for ~80% of poor Core Web Vitals scores:

  1. Render-blocking CSS/JS from page builders that load every component's stylesheet on every page.
  2. Unoptimized hero images — usually a 4MB JPEG that should be a 80KB AVIF, with no fetchpriority hint.
  3. INP killers: long-running JS handlers from chat widgets, analytics, A/B test scripts, and admin-bar scripts leaking to logged-out visitors.
  4. Layout shifts from late-loading ads, embeds, and web fonts without font-display: swap.
  5. Slow TTFB from missing object cache, bloated autoload in wp_options, and N+1 queries on home/archive templates.

What the audit covers

Lab + field data

Lighthouse for the lab view, CrUX / Search Console for what real users actually experience. Both, not just one.

Plugin / theme weight analysis

Which plugins load on every request? Which add the most JS to the front end? Where can be deferred, dequeued, or replaced.

Database health

Autoload bloat, missing indexes, slow queries, transient buildup, post revision sprawl.

Caching topology

Page cache, object cache, edge cache, browser cache. Where each layer is and where it isn't, with a fix list.

Tools used

All licenses included; nothing passed through to you.

  • WP Rocket, Perfmatters, Cloudflare APO for caching and asset control
  • ShortPixel, EWWW, or Cloudflare Polish for image pipelines
  • Query Monitor, New Relic, or DataDog APM for server-side bottlenecks
  • PageSpeed Insights, Lighthouse, WebPageTest, and Chrome UX Report for measurement

Frequently asked questions

What does the audit deliver?

A written report covering: Lighthouse and CrUX field data, the top 5–10 performance issues ranked by impact, an estimated 'what good looks like' target for each Core Web Vitals metric, and a fixed-fee quote for the implementation work. Delivered within 5 business days.

Will my Core Web Vitals turn green?

Most of the time, yes. Sites with structural problems (page-builder bloat, 200+ active plugins, server-side rendering issues) sometimes need a partial rebuild — I'll tell you up front if that's the case rather than running up an hourly bill on a lost cause.

What about INP — isn't FID gone?

Correct. Google replaced FID with Interaction to Next Paint (INP) in March 2024. INP is part of Core Web Vitals now, and it's what most WordPress sites struggle with — it surfaces every blocking JS handler your theme and plugins add. Tuning INP is a core part of every performance engagement here.

Do you support WooCommerce?

Yes. WooCommerce performance work is a regular part of the practice — most of it is database tuning, query optimization, and replacing front-end JS that fires on every page when it shouldn't.

Related reading: The complete guide to Core Web Vitals for WordPress · Advanced WordPress speed optimization techniques

Send your URL, get the audit

Written performance audit with prioritized fixes — within 5 business days, no obligation.

Request your performance audit