The reason is quite simple! It’s not only about what your site visitors want, it’s also about what Google wants. There is a connection between page speed and SEO, and that is why your pages need to load quickly.

Google’s primary objective is to provide users with search results that best fit their queries and provide them with the best solution at the top. Search engines not only serve pages with content that best fits the user’s query, but they also want to display websites that provide a great user experience along with providing relevant, useful information. And you guessed it right, page speed is a part of great user experience. Other user experience factors include things like readability, ease of navigation, and mobile responsiveness.

Pages that load quickly appeal to site visitors and help to decrease the bounce rate. This is another indicator to Google whether or not your site is a good one. When your CodeIgniter website loads slowly (takes longer than 3 seconds to fully load), users will become frustrated, and bounce from your website to find one that quickly provides the information they need.

If users consistently bounce from your site, Google will take notice of that, and you will see a drop in search engine rankings. This is because Google sees a correlation between a high bounce rate and bad user experience, so their algorithm drops your rankings.

If users don’t stay on your website long enough to read your content, Google concludes that it must not be a very good website or that your content is not helpful & valuable to readers. Little do they know that you could have one of the best websites with the best content out there, but your slow load time kept people from experiencing your website.

This makes page speed even more crucial. Page speed can keep users from entering your site in the first place, which means they won’t learn about your business, see your products and services, or read your beneficial information. Most of all, they won’t convert.