5 Best WordPress Cache Plugins To Improve Your Website’s Speed
Visitors have specific expectations when they visit your website. If it’s sluggish and slow – don’t expect them to stick around!
Thankfully, you can enhance your WordPress website by using cache plugins. But which ones?
Today, we break down the top WordPress caching plugins that can help you increase your website’s speed and functionality.
Top 5 WordPress Cache Plugins To Speed Up Your Website
What is Caching and Why Does it Matter?
Caching isn’t all that difficult.
Servers receive a request from the user’s browser whenever they want to access a webpage on your site. The server then processes the request (which can include running database queries) and sends the finished product to the user’s browser.
The finished product is your website, complete with all the documents and elements that give it the appearance that it has. For example, you might have images, a blog, a menu, and a header.
However, particularly for large or clunky websites, it can take some time for users to receive the entire webpage because the server must handle all those requests.
This is where WordPress caching plugins come in.
Depending on the configuration, the caching plugin gives instructions to the server telling it to store some files in RAM or on disk. Therefore, the same content it has previously served can be remembered and duplicated.
The result? Speedier loading, and happier visitors!
5 Best WordPress Cache Plugins To Boost Your Site’s Performance
Now that you are familiar with caching, here are some of the best WordPress caching plugins and services available to make your website load as quickly as possible.
1. WP Rocket
WP Rocket is a robust plugin that implements caching with just one click. It has many features that further improve the performance of your WordPress site, like lazy loading and CSS/JS optimization.
Because WP Rocket does the labor-intensive work for you, it’s ideal for beginners. No coding knowledge is necessary for installation, and no configuration is required to begin seeing results. The cache feature even starts working right away after you enable it.
Additionally, it works with most tools, including hosting and plugins.
Key Features
- Delay Javascript execution time
- CDN integration
- Javascript, HTML, and CSS minification
- Preloading cache
- Lazy image loading
- Integration of Google Analytics to load the server-side code
- Direct Cloudflare integration
- Version rollback
- Database optimization
Pricing
Starting at $59 per year, WP Rocket includes updates, support, and a license for one WordPress site.
2. W3 Total Cache
https://wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/
W3 Total Cache enhances your site’s user experience by accelerating load times, improving server performance, and caching every aspect of your site.
Despite being an excellent option for your website, configuring the plugin will require some technical knowledge and navigating through 16 pages of settings.
Free Key Features
- Object caching support
- Compatible with a range of hosting choices
- Open-source
- SSL support
- Minify and compress code
Premium Key Features
- WordPress Rest API caching
- Lazy loading for Google Maps
- Eliminate render blocking CSS
- Full site delivery via CDN
- Pricing for fragment caching
Pricing
You’ll need to upgrade to Premium and pay $99/year for one website to access more optimization features and customer support. You can only access W3 Total Cache Premium from the plugin’s admin interface.
3. WP Super Cache
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-super-cache/
WP Super Cache is another popular WordPress caching plugin that has plenty of recommended caching features including advanced cache preload, CDN support, page caching, cache pre-loading, and gzip compression.
On top of that, beginners will probably love how user-friendly it is. It has a thorough settings section with a dedicated tab for quick setup.
Key Features
- Three caching methods
- Easy to set up
- Garbage collection to remove outdated files
- Minification and concatenation tools
- Combines CDN integration
- Object caching
Pricing
WP Super Cache is free to use. It doesn’t come in a premium version, and all features are available to users across the board. Win!
4. WP Fastest Cache
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-fastest-cache/
WP Fastest Cache is another fantastic plugin for speeding things up. Compared to its competitors, WP Fastest Cache’s free version has a few modern features to help it stand out. One of these features includes combining HTML and CSS files.
Site administrators can also plan to delete all cached files. That includes even minified JS and CSS files. The cache option for mobile devices and logged-in users can be disabled or enabled by ticking a box on the settings page.
Free Key Features
- CDN integration
- Set post and page expiration dates
- Code minification
- Simple setup
- Exclude specific posts and pages
- One-click cache clearing
Premium Key Features
- Lazy load scripts
- Minifying JavaScript files
- WebP conversion
- Widget & mobile cache
- Eliminating render-blocking JavaScript resources
- Google fonts async
- Database cleanup
Pricing
The pricing model for WP Fastest Cache is a flat rate and changes depending on how many licenses you need. The price ranges from $49.99 for one license to $300.00 (10 licenses).
It’s also important to note that neither the free nor the premium version provides customer support.
5. LiteSpeed Cache
https://wordpress.org/plugins/litespeed-cache/
LiteSpeed Technologies created the popular open-source WordPress caching plugin LiteSpeed Cache.
Being a server-level cache is what sets LiteSpeed Cache apart from other plugins. As a result, even though the plugin is free, its built-in page cache functionality requires using the LiteSpeed Web Server.
Luckily, you can find that some of the best web hosts, such as Hostinger, already use LiteSpeed servers.
Key features
- Free QUIC.cloud CDN Cache
- Built-in page cache (LSCache)
- Automatically generate Critical CSS
- Image Optimization (Lossless/Lossy)
- Lazy-load images/iframes
- Minify CSS, JavaScript, and HTML
- Database Optimizer and Cleaner
- Load CSS Asynchronously
- Defer/delay JS loading
Pricing
Although the plugin is free, a LiteSpeed server is necessary for the cache features, and costs are involved.
Bonus: Check If Your Web Host Already Has A Built-In Caching Solution
If you’re developing a website and prefer not to worry about caching, there are web hosts already with built-in caching solutions. You’ll likely find this advantage on hosts that offer Managed WordPress hosting.
Managed WordPress hosting often includes advanced features like caching, enhanced security, and robust backup solutions. Because of this, you won’t need to worry about caching since the inbuilt systems are professionally configured and maintained.
Although Managed WordPress hosting is more expensive, the improved services and excellent support are a tremendous boost for site owners.
Some of the best Managed WordPress hosting companies include;
- WPEngine is one of the top-managed WordPress hosting companies is WP Engine. Their hosting packages include performance optimization and built-in caching.
- Bluehost is one of the biggest hosting companies in the world and a licensed WordPress hosting partner. You can activate their hosting plans’ built-in caching from your dashboard.
- SiteGround includes an integrated caching solution with each of its hosting packages. Your website’s speed will increase by 50–500% once its dynamic WordPress caching is activated.
Make Your WordPress Website Zippy Through Caching
For users to have the best possible experience, your website must be faster and perform better. Caching is a great and simple way to accomplish that, but choosing the right plugin can be challenging.
When navigating the vast selection of caching plugins available, consider your budget, goals, wants, needs, and level of technical expertise. This checklist will help you to decide which WordPress caching plugin is best for the website.
