7 practical steps to a faster website: how to get LCP under 2.5s

In 2026, website speed is no longer just a technical detail - it directly affects sales, SEO, and user trust. Here are 7 practical steps.

1. Enable HTTP/3

HTTP/3 (over the QUIC protocol) cuts connection setup time by 200-400ms, especially on mobile networks. Cloudflare's free tier supports it without any configuration.

2. Use Brotli compression

Brotli is a compression algorithm developed by Google that's 15-20% better than Gzip. With Cloudflare it's a single toggle.

3. Lazy-load images

All <img> tags that are below the fold should have the loading="lazy" attribute. It's a simple change that can halve initial page load time.

4. Convert PNGs to WebP

WebP is 25-35% smaller than PNG. Every modern browser supports it. Use the <picture> tag with a PNG fallback for older browsers.

5. Minify CSS and JavaScript

Minification removes whitespace and comments and shortens identifiers - typically a 20-40% reduction in file size.

6. Pick fonts carefully

Web fonts (Google Fonts) can add 100-300ms to load time. Apply:

• preconnect to the font domain
• font-display: swap in CSS so text shows while the font loads
• Subsetting - only ship the glyphs your language needs

7. Defer third-party scripts

Google Tag Manager, Tawk.to, Yandex.Metrika - these often add 1-2 seconds to load. Load them with the defer attribute or after the first user interaction.

How to measure progress

Use Google PageSpeed Insights. Pay attention to:

• LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) - < 2.5s is good
• INP (Interaction to Next Paint) - < 200ms is good
• CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift) - < 0.1 is good

Target all three "good" thresholds and your SEO will genuinely improve.