Leverage browser caching is a common term between digital marketers and developers who work for website performance. Enabling leverage browser caching for better SEO results is common practice but today I am going to share some more insights on this. I am going to share what is the meaning of browser caching and how it works with websites. Also what the SEO benefits of using this on your website. So let’s start and learn more about this technique.
Importance of Leverage Browser Caching
It is a method of enabling browsers to save website data such as JavaScript, HTML, CSS, Images and other files to improve the re-visit site performance. Re-visit site performance is when a user open a website in mobile or desktop device and re-open it after some time after closing it. You should know that every time you open a website, your device browser downloads web files to show proper results. Sometimes page contains limited files and contains less data. But when you open a heavy content website which has images or big file size, videos and content in several megabytes then the server response rate of website is usually slow.
At the time of loading a website, each file make a separate request to server which makes it very busy and causes slow responses.
How leverage browser caching works?
It is a method of making certain website pages or some parts of pages as being needed to be updated at different intervals. For example, if you have a static page which has some heavy images in it which you don’t change every day. By enabling leverage browser caching, you can tell visitors browser to only download images once in a month or week or so on. If the users visit website again within defined time period such as a month, week or so on, they will find previous image while navigating website.
You can also take the example of your website logo. Generally it’s pretty common that websites uses the same logo so you can use this method for your website/blog logo image.
Importance and SEO benefits of browser caching
Having a great page speed and serving more visits on website is the AIM of every digital marketer and website owners. By using this method you can solve the problem of website load time and meet the user expectations. It helps to improve site performance by reducing the bounce rate and giving better page speed. You can also visit How to reduce bounce rate for more information. Another major benefit of having using this method is reducing load from web servers which is the main reason of providing better website load response.
How to enable Leverage Browser Caching for website
In order to enable this, you need to edit your website HTTP headers to set expiry times for certain types of files.
Enabling Browser Caching by using .htaccess file
Locate the .htaccess file in your root domain by using ftp clients such as core or filezilla. Use notepad or notepad ++ to edit .htaccess file. Now set the given below parameters to tell user’s browser what types of files to cache.
<IfModule mod_expires.c>
ExpiresActive On
ExpiresByType image/jpg “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType image/jpeg “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType image/gif “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType image/png “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType text/css “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType application/pdf “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType application/javascript “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType application/x-javascript “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType application/x-shockwave-flash “access 1 month”
ExpiresByType image/x-icon “access 1 month”
ExpiresDefault “access 2 days”
</IfModule>
**NOTE** Please adjust the 1 Month into your specified time period. It is just an example but you can adjust the time period according to your website content.
You can also try given below method
Pro Tip
Keep in mind that if you set up too long parameters on files, then website visitors might not get the fresh version of your website or blog even after an update or complete layout change. So be careful while using leverage browser caching.
WordPress Plugin for enabling Browser Caching:
If you are using WordPress for your blog or website then you have an easy option to enable the browser caching. You can install Plugin to enabling Leverage Browser Caching. All you need to do is just install the plugin and activate it.
Pro Tip: Make sure to take the data backup before playing around with plugins.
FAQs – Leverage Browser Caching
You could unable to Leverage Browser Caching for your website by editing your htaccess file on server. Follow the steps written above to enable leverage browser caching using .htaccess file.
Leverage Browser Caching is a term used to define a practice of storing static files of a website in visitor browser. Once the files are saved on users system, browser retrieve them instead asking from server. It is a process to speed up the website loading speed if the user has already visited the web in past.
Hope this information on Leverage Browser Caching would help you to understand the method and it’s SEO benefits. You can now enable the browser caching for your website by following the steps written above. If you have any feedback or suggestion then do comment below.
Keep exploring the TheSEOGuy for latest SEO tips.
Looking for SEO Services in Delhi? talk to our experts today and ask for a free website audit.
Discover more from TheSEOGuy
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.