Dear Google, for years you have been asking us to pay attention to the performance of the website and the loading speed of pages. The aim is to improve the user experience and that’s right. Our users are also your users and you try to offer them a better service, penalizing those websites that can generate a frustrating experience.
Today we play a game and test the home page of Google, what I think is the perfect page for simplicity and response to the intent of users. Recently, dear Google, you have introduced Core Web Vitals, parameters that from 2021 will contribute to the placement of websites. Let’s do Google’s speed test using the PageSpeed Insightstool.
Desktop speed test
Google passes the speed test on desktopwith flying colors, with a rating of 100/100. The largest item is displayed in only 2.2 seconds (LPI), then below the minimum required value. The interaction of page elements is also very fast and happens in 7 milliseconds (RPI): let’s think about how fast Google is in responding to our requests. Very good also the stability of the layout that has a value of 0 (VLC). The only flaw is in the first view with content that has a value of 2 seconds (PVC), but is not one of the Core Web Vitals.
The advice that Google gives itself is to remove the unused JavaScript: it could save 0.2 seconds. The simplicity of the page rewards. We find few elements, only those necessary to respond to the intent of the users. Weighing down the page is the large script that triggers the operation of the search engine. But that’s the essence of Google, and they’ve managed to compress it a lot for the benefit of speed and usability.
Mobile speed test
Well but not very well the result from mobile: 88/100 and Google suggests to itself that it could improve. Well all three Core Web Vitals: 1.6-second LCP, 37-millisecond RPI, 0 VLC. As for desktop analytics, the only out-of-the-ordinary parameter is 1.2-second PVC, but it’s not one of the Core Web Vitals. To make the total assessment worse, the RPI parameter for interactivity appears to be the worst.
Also for the mobile version, Google suggests removing unused JavaScript code that in this case delays the page from loading by 0.81. The other tip is to mark touch and wheel event listeners as passive to improve page scrolling performance.
Google’s Speed Test: The Verdict
Google does well with the desktop version, while it can improve with the mobile version.
Why does Google ask us for speed and a first mobile site, but has some flaws in smartphone viewing? Let’s think about the habit of using: from the desktop we use the Google website to do online searches, while from mobile we are used to using the app. For the use we make of it, the Google home page is therefore perfect.
We have to learn a lesson from this. Core Web Vitals will be one of the positioning factors from 2021, as Google has stated,but they won’t be the only ones. The user experience, intent, and content will always be the most important factors. These parameters are very important to improve the performance of our website and we must take this into account. Our goal is quality:each site has a different story and has its own audience that is more important than Google itself.
