critical JS/CSS slows pages - bad for SEO and google ranking

The new SEO tools are nice but since page speed is one of the most relevant aspects you should do something about slow loading.

Just a few examples of what Googles PageSpeedInsights tell me:

Eliminate render-blocking resources. Estimated savings: 4.19 s

Details:

Resources are blocking the first paint of your page. Consider delivering critical JS/CSS inline and deferring all non-critical JS/styles.

URL Size Potential Savings

/ik/_PbYZD3ye….js(use.typekit.net) 8 KB 780 ms

…scripts-compressed/common-526b9c5…-min.en-US.js(assets.squarespace.com) 424 KB 3,330 ms

…156…/site.css?&filterFeatures=false(static1.squarespace.com) 51 KB 1,380 ms

Can I do anything myself?

This isn't something we or anyone else can fix. I suggest you raise your concerns with Squarespace Customer Care. You can reach out to them here.

I have the same issue, did you get any feedback from customer services?

We were noticing the same thing when reviewing the performance of our site. It would be interesting what the Squarespace team's thoughts are. If you can share, it would be great.

Yep. Yep. Yep.

Any word from Squarespace Team on this issue?

Google's PageSpeed Insights tool examines a site's code to provide suggestions and best practices for speeding up a site. The tool is useful when coding your own site, but can present misleading results for sites built on a CMS platform, like Squarespace. Check this Squarespace help guide for more specifics:

Google's PageSpeed Insights errors

I would just like to reiterate this is still an issue and a huge negative for SEO. I suggest we ask SS to remedy it. 

I'm encountering the same issues with the website of a client. This has to be fixed asap as it really impacts SEO! 

On 12/5/2019 at 7:44 AM, srodrigues said:

Google's PageSpeed Insights tool examines a site's code to provide suggestions and best practices for speeding up a site. The tool is useful when coding your own site, but can present misleading results for sites built on a CMS platform, like Squarespace. Check this Squarespace help guide for more specifics:

Google's PageSpeed Insights errors

But isn't Google the one evaluating our sites for SEO purposes? It seems like our speed only matters if they can see it.

I'm having the same issues as everyone else here. We need Squarespace to help fix this.

We are having this same issue. It seems Squarespace websites across the board are slow because of loading 1mb of java script blocking early page rendering. GT Metrix, Website Grader, Google Page Speed Insights, Screaming Frog and other tools all rank Squarespace sites very poorly because of this issue. Can it be addressed?

While fast load times are good, their importance is exaggerated. Run any of your top-ranked competitors through Google's Page Speed Insights tool and I bet you'll see they receive poor grades too.

Focus on backlinks, useful content, and building your brand's online presence. It'll help your site far more than anything you can do in regards to speed optimization.

This is a serious issue. Per the admin's link above, you will get more accurate results by running Chrome Dev Tools locally... it's STILL an issue.

Here are instructions for creating a similar report through your Chrome browser: https://developers.google.com/web/tools/lighthouse#devtools

I'm wondering if anyone has created a template that eliminates the biggest offending scripts from SquareSpace? I would pay for this! Here's a list of the slowest scripts per my report [TIME DELAY]:

use.typekit.net.../ik/vK8u1-ck4….js [2,220 ms]
assets.squarespace.com…scripts-compressed/common-fc3e2ea…-min.en-US.js [3,870 ms]
assets.squarespace.com…scripts-compressed/commerce-74f3967…-min.en-US.js [2,550 ms]
static1.squarespace.com…159…/site.css?&filterFeatures=false [1,880 ms]

Total delay from these render-blocking resources = 10.52 seconds

Yea... I'm getting the same response from Semrush. Testing 123 Squarespace> Anyone home?

Hi all,

So I have the same speed test issues of course... because well all Squarespace sites do (unless maybe dev mode). 7.1 does seem to test better than 7.0.

On tools like Pingdom the actual load times are very satisfactory (1.95s with a score of 88...would like to see a score of 95 or better though). And in the "wild" SQS sites load at a fine speed and in some cases faster than sites that test better. BUT when testing in Lighthouse and GooglePage Speed the results are not awesome.

Squarespace has a great set of tools matched nicely to the needs of many businesses and non-profits. The client/designer collaboration and handoff process is smooth and the system flexible for clients after handoff. I've used Wordpress, Webflow, other WYSWYG editors and Squarespace. Out of all of them Squarespace has produced the best client satisfaction for tool set, ease of use, performance, flexibility and maintenance. But again speed testing represents the platform poorly. 

I've researched, what seems endlessly, on how significantly speed tests results impact SERP rank and have found no definitive answer. There are even articles available about why you should ignore speed testing results and just go with actual load times (so maybe speed test results don't matter). What I have found is that Squarespace sites, just like sites built on other platforms, can rank on page one of Google if content and SEO strategy are good. 

Handing off or maintaining client projects in other platforms like Webflow is a headache as the flow is awkward but the platform generates great speed testing results. Also AMP which is available in SQS can impact SERP and speed performance and it's hard evaluate how it impacts results...but it should be positive.

But I wish Squarespace would address speed testing and it would feel even better to use Squarespace for projects. And easier to demonstrate the platforms strengths. 

as an aside: Website Grader use to be a good tool to use but with Hubspot's changes to it, well performing sites have dropped in scores.

Just leaving this here.  https://blog.chromium.org/2020/05/introducing-web-vitals-essential-metrics.html

Any news on this? Following on from @JasonGipson's link shared above.

It seems these page speed metrics will impact rankings more going forward. Ideally, if we can exclude assets rendering that are unused somehow that would be great! 🙂

See more from Google on this here: https://web.dev/vitals/