WordPress Website on SiteGround Running Slow How to Fix
A slow WordPress website can frustrate visitors, affect the user experience and make it harder for people to explore your content. If your website takes too long to load, visitors may leave before they read your articles or click your links.
The good news is that you can often improve WordPress website speed by checking a few important settings rather than installing lots of additional plugins.
I use WordPress for my online business website, MattFeastOnline.com, and SiteGround for hosting. Like many website owners, I’ve had to learn how caching, image optimisation, plugins and website settings work together.
In this guide, I’ll explain how to fix a slow WordPress website on SiteGround, including practical steps you can follow even if you’re not particularly technical.
1. Check your website speed before making changes
Before changing anything, test your website to find out where the problem might be.
Google PageSpeed Insights is a useful starting point. Enter your website address and run a test. The report provides information about performance on mobile and desktop devices, along with suggestions for improvement.
Suggested alt text: Testing WordPress website speed with Google PageSpeed Insights.
Pay particular attention to these areas:
- Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): Measures how quickly the main content becomes visible. Google recommends 2.5 seconds or less for a good result.
- Interaction to Next Paint (INP): Measures how quickly a page responds to user interactions. A good result is 200 milliseconds or less.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): Measures unexpected movement of page elements. A good result is 0.1 or less.
These measurements help you understand the visitor experience, but don’t worry if your website doesn’t achieve a perfect score.
Test a few important pages, including your homepage, a recent blog post and a page containing several images. Different pages can have different performance problems.
You can use Google PageSpeed Insights to run your own tests.
2. Use SiteGround’s caching features
Caching is one of the first things I’d check when troubleshooting a slow WordPress website.
Without effective caching, WordPress may need to process requests and generate pages repeatedly. Caching can store certain results so that subsequent visits require less work.
SiteGround provides performance tools for compatible WordPress websites, including its Speed Optimizer plugin.
Start by logging into your WordPress dashboard and opening SG Optimizer, sometimes displayed as Speed Optimizer depending on your plugin version.
Look for the caching settings and check whether the available caching features are enabled.
Suggested alt text: Checking WordPress caching settings to improve website speed.
Depending on your hosting plan and website configuration, available options may include dynamic caching and other performance features.
Don’t assume every setting is available on every plan. Check the options shown in your own dashboard and follow SiteGround’s instructions for your particular setup.
After making changes, clear the relevant caches and revisit your website.
If your website uses another caching plugin alongside SiteGround’s tools, check that the plugins aren’t duplicating the same functions or causing conflicts.
Caching can make a noticeable difference, but it won’t automatically fix every performance problem. Large images, slow scripts and excessive plugins can still affect loading times.
3. Optimise your images
Images can make a blog more attractive and easier to read, but oversized image files can slow down your pages.
For example, uploading a very large photograph when your article only displays it at a much smaller size means visitors may download more data than necessary.
Here are some practical ways to improve image performance.
Resize images before uploading them. Choose dimensions suitable for the space where the image will appear. You usually don’t need a photograph several thousand pixels wide for a small image within a blog post.
Compress image files. Image compression reduces file size while maintaining acceptable visual quality.
Use modern image formats where appropriate. WebP and AVIF can offer smaller files than traditional formats such as JPEG or PNG, depending on the image.
Avoid uploading unnecessary images. Every additional image can add to the amount of content a visitor needs to download.
Suggested alt text: Optimising images to improve WordPress website performance.
I use Optimole as part of my website’s image optimisation setup. If you use an image optimisation service, check its settings and confirm that the images on your website are being processed as expected.
Be careful not to enable several overlapping image optimisation systems without checking how they interact.
You should also check that image dimensions remain appropriate and that the pictures still look good on mobile devices.
4. Review the plugins installed on WordPress
WordPress plugins add useful features, but poorly configured or resource-intensive plugins can contribute to slow loading times.
The solution isn’t to remove every plugin. Instead, review what you have installed and decide whether each one provides enough value to justify keeping it.
Open your WordPress dashboard and select Plugins.
Look for plugins that you no longer use, duplicate functionality or provide features that aren’t important to your website.
For example, you might have several plugins handling similar caching, image optimisation or social sharing tasks. You may not need all of them.
Before removing a plugin, check whether another part of your website depends on it. Removing the wrong plugin could affect your layout, forms, security or other important features.
Deactivate and remove unnecessary plugins carefully, one at a time. Then test your homepage and several important articles.
If you notice a problem after making a change, you can investigate the most recent change rather than trying to work out which of several changes caused it.
For more complicated issues, a staging website can help you test changes without affecting your live visitors.
5. Check your SiteGround hosting and server resources
Your hosting environment also plays a role in website performance.
SiteGround provides WordPress hosting with performance features, but your website’s actual speed will depend on several factors, including its configuration, traffic, theme, plugins and content.
If your website remains slow after you’ve checked caching and images, look at your hosting account.
Check whether your hosting plan has resource limits that might affect your website during busy periods. If your hosting dashboard provides relevant resource statistics, look for signs of repeated limits or unusual spikes.
You should also check whether the website is consistently slow or only struggles at certain times.
If you suspect a server-side problem, contact SiteGround support and explain what you’ve tested. Provide example page URLs and any relevant speed-test results.
Ask whether they can identify hosting resource issues or configuration problems affecting your website.
Don’t automatically upgrade your hosting plan just because a speed test reports a low score. First establish whether the hosting environment is actually the cause.
A hosting upgrade may help in some circumstances, but it won’t necessarily resolve problems caused by large images, excessive scripts or a poorly configured website.
6. Reduce unnecessary scripts and external services
Some websites load scripts from advertising networks, analytics tools, embedded videos, social media widgets and other external services.
Each additional script can introduce work for the browser. Some also require connections to external servers before parts of the page can finish loading.
Review the features running on your website and consider whether you genuinely need them.
For example, you might be able to remove an unused social media widget or replace a heavy embedded element with a simpler link or preview.
Don’t remove analytics or security tools without considering their purpose. The goal is to remove unnecessary work, not to sacrifice useful functionality.
If you’re unsure which scripts are causing problems, PageSpeed Insights can provide clues through its diagnostics. More advanced users can also inspect the page with Chrome DevTools.
Make changes gradually and test the website afterwards. A script that looks unnecessary may be required for an important feature.
7. Check your WordPress theme and mobile performance
Your WordPress theme controls much of the website’s layout and appearance. Some themes load more scripts, styles and design elements than others.
If your website has lots of animations, large sliders, elaborate menus or other visual features, these may contribute to performance problems.
You don’t necessarily need to change your theme. Start by reviewing the features you already have and disabling anything unnecessary.
Mobile performance deserves particular attention because mobile devices may have less processing power and slower network connections than desktop computers.
Open your website on your phone and check whether the homepage, navigation and articles load smoothly.
Look for oversized images, layout problems, intrusive pop-ups and elements that take too long to appear.
Google PageSpeed Insights provides separate mobile and desktop reports, so compare both rather than relying only on the desktop score.
If you decide to test another theme, do so on a staging site first. Changing themes can affect layouts, menus and widgets, so it is worth checking everything before making a permanent switch.
8. Clear your cache and test your changes
After making performance changes, clear the relevant caches so you can check the updated version of your website.
Depending on your setup, you may need to clear the cache through SG Optimizer, your hosting tools or an additional caching service.
If you use Optimole or another image optimisation service, allow time for any processing or delivery changes to take effect.
You can then revisit your website in a private browser window and test several pages.
Run PageSpeed Insights again and compare the results with your original tests. Look at the specific diagnostics you were trying to improve, not just the overall score.
If your website looks broken or a feature stops working, investigate the most recent change. Restore the previous setting if necessary and test again.
Keep a simple record of what you changed and what happened. This makes future troubleshooting much easier.
9. Avoid common WordPress speed mistakes
When trying to improve website speed, it’s easy to make unnecessary changes or install too many tools.
Here are a few mistakes worth avoiding.
Installing too many optimisation plugins. More plugins don’t automatically mean better performance. Choose tools that work well together and avoid duplicated features.
Chasing a perfect score. A score of 100 isn’t essential for every website. Focus on the actual visitor experience, Google’s performance metrics and the specific problems reported by your tests.
Changing several settings at once. If you change everything together, it becomes difficult to identify which adjustment helped or caused a problem.
Ignoring mobile users. A website that looks fast on a powerful desktop computer may perform differently on a phone.
Making changes without a backup. Before making significant changes to plugins, themes or configuration, ensure you have a recent backup and know how to restore it.
Assuming hosting is always the problem. Slow performance can come from many sources. Check the evidence before spending money on a different plan or additional tools.
10. Choose reliable hosting for your WordPress website
Your hosting provider is an important part of your website setup. Reliable hosting, sensible caching and a well-maintained WordPress installation can provide a solid foundation for blogging and online business.
I use SiteGround for MattFeastOnline.com, and its hosting tools are part of my website management setup. However, no hosting provider can guarantee that every website will be fast regardless of its configuration.
Before choosing a hosting plan, compare the available features, renewal prices, resource limits, support options and backup arrangements.
If you’re starting a blog or building an online business, choose a plan that suits your current needs rather than paying for features you may not use.
Final thoughts
Fixing a slow WordPress website doesn’t always require expensive upgrades or a complete redesign.
Start by testing your website, checking SiteGround’s caching settings, optimising images and reviewing unnecessary plugins. Then investigate scripts, theme features and hosting resources if the problem continues.
Make one change at a time and measure the results. This approach helps you understand what works for your particular website instead of following speed advice that may not apply to your setup.
For me, maintaining MattFeastOnline.com is part of building a long-term online business. A website needs useful content, a good user experience and ongoing attention to technical issues.
Website speed is one part of that process, and a sensible routine of testing and maintenance can help keep your blog working smoothly as it grows.
Looking for WordPress hosting?
If you’re planning to build a website or want to review your hosting options, take a look at SiteGround and compare its current plans and features before deciding.
If you’re serious about building your blog and growing your online business, choosing the right hosting provider is a good place to start. I use SiteGround for MattFeastOnline.com, and it’s worth checking out if you’re looking for WordPress hosting for your own website.
Check out SiteGround’s hosting plans and see if they’re right for you.
Take a look at some great offers:
Disclosure: This article contains a hosting recommendation. I may receive a commission if you purchase through my referral link, at no additional cost to you.