If you've done any research into SEO practices, you will understand that website speed is pretty important.  
  
Website or site rate is a ranking factor used by Google, giving sites with faster rates precedent in search results. It is all part of providing better outcomes to their users because the truth is, people do not need to hang around for slow-loading websites.  
  
The answer is, not complete controller, but you still have options to optimize site speed.  
  
Here Is What you can do:  
  
Get our record variant here: What to do to Accelerate your Squarespace site  
  
Site speed: It matters  
  
Search engine optimization is important concerning your site getting found organically in search results, however, that is not the only reason to prioritize site rank. Think of what you do when you land on a website which takes too long to load. Do you hang around and wait?   
  
Most individuals won't hang around. This analysis shows they will depart the site if it doesn't load within three seconds. This seems like a short time, but with improvements in internet speeds over the years, we've been conditioned to expect that things must get the job done fast. Otherwise, there is bound to be a competing website to test out instead.  
  
So while SEO is an issue, there's another thing which ought to be a bigger concern: user experience. Improving website speed provides a better user experience and ensures your site visitors are more likely to stick around a little longer.  
  
Test your Site first  
  
You may test your site speed first.  
  
There are a few distinct tools available to assist and most will also generate a report highlighting problem areas. This is helpful so you're not left to guess.  
  
Squarespace urges that you either use their built-in tools, or a tool such as Pingdom to make certain you're receiving accurate results. If you're using the Google Chrome browser, you can follow those steps:  
  
  
  
Open Developer Tools.  
  
  
Click the Network tab.  
  
Refresh the page to show the js stop loading page time.  
  
They state this is prone to error because it is intended for developers who code their websites from scratch and may return false negatives for Squarespace sites that are built on a custom CMS. That means if you use it and register an error, that doesn't necessarily imply there's anything wrong with webpage speed on your website.  
  
Methods to speed up a Squarespace Site   
  
Listed below are a few areas where you may Have the Ability to Decrease load speed of your site and of individual pages:  
  
  
REDUCE IMAGE SIZES  
  
  
This is a basic that we'd anticipate most designers to know, yet large image files are still frequently the culprit behind slow-loading pages. We know - you are trying to hit the right balance with picture quality and retain that sharp appearance onscreen, but you don't need print quality images to attain this.  
  
Some key things to remember are:  
  
Use JPG over PNG most of the time (some vector images don't look so great in JPG).  
  
Keep the picture width low. Squarespace recommends that you don't go past 1500 - 2000 pixels in diameter, but sometimes, you may be able to make them even smaller.  
  
The Getty stock images or free Unsplash images you can download and insert directly through Squarespace are often big. To make them smaller, you could download them in the webpage you have put them on and use a picture resizing tool to reduce file size.  
  
There are numerous free picture resizing tools. For example: PicResize, ResizeImage and Tiny PNG.  
  
  
  
A sort of"quick win" with Squarespace website speed is to be certain that you're using the SSL option. Why? Because your site is going to be delivered through the quicker HTTP/2 protocol.  
  
You could also consider switching to the HSTS alternative, that has been found to improve security and SEO.   
  
  
  
Switching on AMP (Accelerated Mobile Web Pages) can significantly improve page speed for blog posts, particularly on mobile devices. It is pretty important to keep in mind mobile when you're looking at page speed because a lot of surfing activity happens on mobile devices.  
  
When AMP is switched on it is going to deliver quite fast-loading site pages to mobile users, provided that those have been accessed through a Google search.  
  
AMP works by stripping out"non-essential" coding from a page and utilizing clever caching to load webpages immediately. It's worth reading up on it first as it simplifies a number of standard Squarespace cubes, such as form cubes and code blocks.   
  
  
WATCH THIRD-PARTY SCRIPTS  
  
  
There are all types of third party scripts you might be running on a Squarespace website, including those associated with plugins you choose to add. As a general rule, only add those that are absolutely necessary to achieve the functionality you need on your site - extras may slow you down.  
  
If you've had your site going for a while and you're not certain what impact third-party scripts are getting on site rate, it is worth doing an audit. The website speed tools we discussed previously can tell you that are slowing your website down.  
  
Another thing we'd suggest is being quite selective in the first place about which third-party plugins you allow. A general rule would be to go for reputable, well-reviewed tools that have a clear history of regular updates by the proprietor. Plugins that aren't kept updated can really drag a website down.  
  
  
DON'T GO TOO FONT-CRAZY!  
  
  
We all know. Some fonts are just so stylish, you need to get them on your website. Web fonts can really produce the appearance of a website, however the problem is they can also drag down load rate.  
  
You will find a set of typefaces which are considered "web safe" with nominal impact on website speed, but naturally these are your boring ones, like Times New Roman or Arial. Most individuals do opt to utilize some form of internet fonts to spice up the look of the webpage.  
  
Here are some things to think about:  
  
There is some evidence to suggest that Google Fonts load more rapidly than Typekit fonts. (Both of which are available in Squarespace's web font library).  
  
Try to stick with only 1 web font. Should you go too"font-crazy," it's likely to slow your website down.  
  
  
USE CUSTOM VIDEO THUMBNAILS  
  
  
Do you have embedded videos in your own Squarespace site? If this is the case, selecting the custom thumbnail alternative for video embeds can help improve speed.  
  
There are a couple of reasons for this: firstly, without the custom thumbnail, Squarespace might have to look up articles and load it out of any website that the video is uploaded too (e.g. YouTube or even Vimeo). This occurs even if the visitor does not click on the video and may lead to a lag if large files are being loaded.  
  
Second, doing without a habit thumbnail leaves you open to third-party cookies being run on your website - yet another speed bump.  
  
  
  
If you're running Squarespace 7.0, specific templates permit you to enable Ajax loading (asynchronous Javascript and XML). This means it can tell browsers to load your website one page at a time, speeding up the total load time for visitors.  
  
Final thoughts  
  
Squarespace recommends that wherever possible, restricting your pages into below 5mb in size. This ought to keep you close to optimum performance speed-wise.  
  
The hints listed above should keep your pages below that 5mb threshold. We would also add that it's important to avoid a lot of embeds on one page. These can otherwise invite third-party scripts to operate and may inhibit your speed.