Sometimes WordPress can start acting sluggish. Have you noticed your site is just crawling along at unbearable speeds? We’ll take a look at some simple ways to keep WordPress running at its full potential. Just remember to always backup your website before making any drastic changes!
Clean up revisions
Revisions can pile up and clutter your database. WordPress currently has no options for controlling the amount of revisions. However, there are some plugins that allow for revision customization. I dug pretty deep to find just the right plugin. Right now, I have been using Revision Control. Revision Control allows for basic, but effective, customization. We can set posts and pages to keep a maximum amount of revisions. Plus, we can easily delete old revisions from the database. This will clear up database clutter and help things run smooth.
Compress images
Images can take up massive space. If images aren’t compressed, it can cause webpages to load slower. Image compression can decrease file size while keeping quality. This may greatly improve page loading, especially if you’re using lots of images. There’s a plugin with auto compression called WP Smush.it. I have used this in the past but had problems with it. Now I compress my images directly through Yahoo’s Smush.it before uploading them to my website. Plus, now I started using Jetpack’s free Photon service – and wow, I’m impressed. I highly recommend using it.
Optimize database
A very simple way to improve speed is to do a database optimization. In your web-host’s cPanel, click on the phpMyAdmin icon. Log-in and choose your database on the left-hand side. When the tables of the database appear, scroll to the bottom and click the link Check All. Next, click on the drop-down menu and choose Optimize table. Here’s a quick tutorial on how to optimize the SQL database.
You may want to do this every so often. For a quick experiment – load a page on your website to check the speed, then optimize the database. Once optimized, load another page on your website. Hopefully you see the difference – I always do.
Limit plugins
Plugins are one of the best reasons for using WordPress. Yes, they are great but they can take up space and bandwidth. It’s better to limit the use of plugins to keep your site running fast. How many is too many? Honestly, I have no idea. I have a personal rule of keeping under 10 plugins at once. Even for me, 10 seems like too many. If your site is way too slow, try deactivating a plugin. If your site speed greatly improves, it may be time to scrap that plugin.
Empty trash
Marking comments as spam and deleting posts/pages will still save them in your database. Emptying spam and trash will completely clear out everything from the database. Having them in the trash will not rid them from the database until the trash is emptied. Don’t hoard junk in WordPress. If you don’t need it, delete it for good.