Page speed has been a ranking factor for desktop searches since April 2010, but it was never officially a ranking factor for mobile searches (despite what we’ve all suspected for a long time). Not until July 2018, that is, when Google rolled out the Speed Update[1].
Google’s pushing for a faster mobile experience
The Speed Update is the latest in a long list of speed-related updates, tools, and technologies that Google has developed over the last decade – many of which specifically target the mobile experience.
For example, PageSpeed tools, such as the modules for servers like Apache and Nginx[2], PageSpeed reports in Google Search Console and Google Analytics, and plugins like the PageSpeed Chrome Developer Tools[3] extension have become par for course since their introduction back in 2010.
Since then, Google has introduced tools such as the Mobile-Friendly Test[4] to help websites gauge their responsiveness.
They’ve also launched Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), which allows content creators to make lightweight and lightning-fast versions of pages for their mobile audiences, and Progressive Web Apps (PWA), which load content instantly regardless of a user’s network state.
And, in the past 6 months alone, Google has further introduced an onslaught of new speed-related tools, including:
- Lighthouse – helps users automatically audit and optimize web pages
- Impact Calculator and Mobile Speed Scorecard – grades your mobile site’s speed and calculates what impact your site speed is having on your conversion rates and revenue
- Chrome User Experience Report (CrUX) – a database of real user experience metrics from Chrome users.
Google also transitioned to ‘mobile-first’ indexing[5] in February 2018, which means it