5 Best Tools to Test Website Speed and Performance

Is your site’s bounce rate increasing? Does the conversion rate seem to be stagnating? Perhaps you’re experiencing these issues. If so, you need to evaluate your website’s performance and speed. But, is there a way to check that? Yes, and thanks to the speed and performance testing tools.

A variety of tools are available to help you know how your website is performing. Some tools are free, while others require a fee. Let us explore what are some of the most helpful tools you should not ignore.

Before we begin, let us share a few key facts with you

What is website speed?

Upon clicking a link, the visitor can access the website. The downloading of website content from hosting servers takes a while. Page load time is the time between clicking on a link and the entire page loading.

What is website performance?

A website’s performance is determined by the speed at which its pages load and display. So, to get good website performance, it is crucial to speed it up.

Why is the performance and speed of the website important?

A website that performs poorly and loads slowly is certainly not helpful for your users. This will negatively affect your business. How does your website’s performance affect your business? Well, take a look.

• User experience:
  Your website must provide a great user experience. Is it possible if it loads slowly? No way. According to Google a good-performing website loads within 2 seconds. Have you realized what your visitors expect from your website? Speed up your site and meet their expectations. And you know how important this is.
• To retain your customers:
  A higher bounce rate is certainly undesirable. In fact, your site must retain visitors. As a result, your site must load quickly. A quick load will help you retain visitors. Visitors will certainly return to your site again and again.
• Higher conversion:
  A well-performing website improves conversion rates. You are likely to sell more products if your site performs well. Growing your business will be easier if your site performs well.
• Improve brand identity:
  A poorly functioning website can harm a brand’s identity. You can’t build your brand’s identity with a slow loading page. As a result, your business website should perform better.

The best website speed and performance testing tools

You need to take proper measures to ensure your website loads quickly. We’ve compiled a list of the tools you may find helpful. So, take a look.

Google Page speed Insight

The tool helps to provide a page speed score of a website for free. It also analyzes the content of the website.

How does it work?

• It provides the page speed score after inserting the URL of the website.
• In fact, using page insights you can get scores for both mobile and website.
• Using this tool is certainly beneficial. After all, you get advice on how to improve response time.

Using Page speed insights, we can obtain field data. In order to improve your website’s performance, you need to understand field data. The following are what we can get from the field data:

• FCP or First Contentful Paint: Loading time of the first text or image.
• LCP or Largest Contentful Paint: Loading time of the largest text or image.
• FID or First Input Delay: The time it takes for the browser to respond to the first action from the user.
• CLS or Cumulative Layout Shift: It helps measure any page movement.

GTmetrix

Another performance testing tool that is generally free to use is GTmetrix. This tool is easy to use hence users find it very useful.

How does it work?

• This tool can provide you with a website’s performance result easily. Simply, insert the URL of the page you want to check the performance.
• You can sign up for free or you can simply register for the paid version.
• It provides performance scores using alphabets (A-F).

The following data is obtained from GTmetrix:

• LCP or Largest Contentful Paint: Loading time of the largest text or image.
• TBT or Total Blocking Time: Time it takes for a page to be blocked before a user can take action.
• CLS or Cumulative Layout Shift: It helps measure any page movement.

Site 24×7

Another useful free website speed and performance testing tool is Site 24×7. However, the paid version is also available.

How does it work?

• This tool is helpful for monitoring the website, network, and also server.
• You can easily use this tool on Windows, Linux, and also FreeBSD.
• You get five server monitors and fifty alters per month with the paid version. The free version, however, is limited to five servers and 10 alters per month.

Web page Test

It is another speed testing tool that is free. In fact, it can be operated from a variety of locations around the world.

How does it work?

• You can get advanced or straightforward testing if you use this tool.
• It offers a visual comparison and a traceroute test.
• You can choose how many tests you want to run if you choose advance testing.

Uptime

You must pay to use this particular testing tool. This testing tool is for websites, servers, and also domains.

How does it work?

• There are four plans to choose from, and they are all paid.
• With the basic plan, you get 20 checks. However, you get 500 checks with an enterprise plan.
• The best part is it gives you a 21-day free trial.

How do you choose the right testing tool?

Choosing the right testing tool for your website can be challenging. Let experts handle it for you. In this regard, you can actually find a leading web application development Company. These companies offer more than just website design and development. They can actually track your website’s performance. So, they can help you select the right tool.

Conclusion

Hopefully, now you understand what the best testing tools are. You can now easily identify which tool is the most appropriate for your website.