What to Know About Caching For Website Speed & Performance

Caching plays a vital role in website speed and performance, and it’s one of the main factors that affect how fast data and information are presented to users. It also determines the front-end and back-end load times while minimising stress on the website’s origin server. For this reason, having the most effective cache setup can make all the difference in your website.

In this article, we will share what you need to know about caching for the speed and performance of your website.

What is caching?

Caching is the process of storing data and information in a cache, which serves as a temporary storage location. These files stored in a cache can then be accessed more quickly. Generally, web browsers cache HTML files, JavaScript, and images for loading websites. While DNS servers do so for DNS records for faster lookups, CDN servers cache content to reduce latency.

If you’re wondering how caching works, it all starts when you load a webpage. The browser will download plenty of data to display the webpage. It will then cache most of the content by saving copies of it on your device’s hard drive. This means that the next time you load the page, it will load much more quickly since the content has already been stored from your previous visit.

Two main locations of caches

Now, let’s look at two primary locations where data and information are stored in a cache. Take note of the following details:

• Browser caching: The data and information are stored on the visitor’s computer through a browser cache. When you visit a web page the next time, the multiple data stored allows you to view the web page a lot faster than when you did the first time. Also, there’s no need to make as many requests back to the website origin server.

• Server-side caching: The data and information are stored on a cache server that sits on top of the website’s origin server. The cache server can be installed locally or through a content delivery solution. As opposed to browser caching, this serves multiple visitors from the same cache without requiring them to make requests from the origin server for a faster page load time.

Here at Hosted WP, we provide server-side caching and other features such as WP hosting in Australia or our own virtual server, backup, free SSL, CDN, and other custom solutions. Our goal is to provide WordPress support with a super high-performance server, ultra-secure site, and server perfect for WooCommerce and LMS.  

What content types are cached

If you’re wondering what data and information are usually cached, below are some of these:

Items frequently cached:

• Static images
• Stylesheets
• Logos and brand assets
• JavaScript that doesn’t change often

Items sometimes cached:

• HTML documents
• API Calls
• JavaScript or other code that changes more frequently

Items that mustn’t be cached:

• User-specific data (order history and account information)
• Any sensitive data and confidential information

Conclusion

At this point, we’ve covered what you need to know about caching. To that end, be sure to consider all the valuable information discussed above and check what type of caching service your provider offers, whether browser or server-side caching. Ultimately, be sure to work with a highly reliable WordPress hosting service provider that can offer the most effective caching setup for your website speed and performance!

As a WP hosting service in Australia, we provide the best hosting solutions optimised for WordPress environments, powered by Tier 1 Data Centers. If you need server-side caching, check our monthly plans and get in touch with us today to see how we can help!