Here is the order I work in when a client’s Elementor page is slow, and what to check at each step.
Measure before you change anything
Run the page through PageSpeed Insights with the mobile setting and note three numbers:
- Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): when the biggest thing on screen, usually the hero image or headline, finishes loading. Aim for under 2.5 seconds.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): how much the page jumps while loading. Aim for under 0.1.
- Interaction to Next Paint (INP): how quickly the page responds to taps. Aim for under 200 milliseconds.
PageSpeed also names the LCP element. That tells you where to start.
1. Fix the hero
On most landing pages the hero image is the LCP element, and it’s often a 3000-pixel photo set as a section background.
- Size it for the screen. A mobile hero rarely needs to be wider than about 800 pixels, and desktop rarely more than 1600.
- Compress it and serve WebP or AVIF. Most image plugins and caching plugins can convert automatically.
- Use an Image widget rather than a background image for the main hero picture when you can. A real image element can be given loading priority; a CSS background is discovered late.
- Don’t lazy-load the hero. Lazy loading is right for images further down, wrong for the first thing people see. Set it to load eagerly with high fetch priority.
- Drop sliders, video backgrounds and animations above the fold. They delay the moment the page looks ready and rarely help conversion.
2. Turn on Elementor’s performance features
Elementor has added a set of performance options over the last few versions. In the Elementor settings (look under Features and Performance), enable the ones your version offers, such as improved asset loading, optimized markup, inline font icons, lazy-loaded background images and element caching. Test the page after each change, especially on older sites built with custom code.
Two structural choices matter too:
- Use Flexbox containers instead of old sections and columns. They produce far less HTML, which makes the page lighter to render. My guide on containers vs sections explains the switch.
- Keep nesting shallow. Five containers inside each other to position one heading adds weight on every page view.
3. Cut fonts and scripts
Fonts and third-party scripts are the quiet weight on most landing pages.
- Two font families, few weights. Each weight is a separate file. Regular and semibold are usually enough.
- Load Google Fonts locally with Elementor’s setting or your caching plugin, and use font-display swap so text shows immediately.
- Audit plugins and widgets. Addon packs, pop-up builders, chat widgets and sliders each add CSS and JavaScript. If the landing page doesn’t use them, make sure they don’t load on it.
- Delay non-essential scripts such as chat, heatmaps and social embeds until the visitor interacts, using your caching plugin’s delay feature. Keep conversion tracking working, and check it still fires after the change.
4. Cache and serve it well
- Page caching with LiteSpeed Cache on LiteSpeed hosting, or WP Rocket or your host’s cache elsewhere. A cached page skips PHP and the database entirely.
- A CDN for images, CSS and JavaScript if your visitors are far from your server.
- A decent host. If the first byte takes more than about 600 milliseconds even for cached pages, no front-end tweak will fully fix it.
One warning: some caching and minification settings can break forms that rely on short-lived security tokens. After enabling caching, submit your own form and check the lead arrives.
5. Check layout shift
If the page jumps while loading, visitors tap the wrong thing. The usual causes are images without set dimensions, fonts swapping in with very different sizes, and banners or cookie notices pushing content down. Give images width and height, reserve space for anything that loads late, and use overlay-style cookie notices.
When to stop optimising
Chasing a perfect 100 score is rarely worth it. Once the page loads its main content in under 2.5 seconds on mobile, doesn’t jump and responds quickly, more time on speed usually returns less than time on the headline, proof and offer. My guide on why landing pages don’t convert covers those.
If you want it done for you, fast pages are part of every build on my landing page design service.