App for Cloudflare® vs Speed Optimizer – The All-In-One Performance-Boosting Plugin

Unlock advanced Cloudflare features without being a network administrator or developer. Works with any Cloudflare plan (including Free), no Automatic Platform Optimization (APO) subscription needed. Cache HTML at network edge Preload JavaScript and CSS View/set all Cloudflare settings Fixes Cloudflare Flexible SSL redirect loops Fixes situation when IPs are coming through as Cloudflare IPs rather than user IPs Cloudflare web analytics support Cloudflare analytics on dashboard Purge cache Automatic image transformations (automatically serve AVIF/WebP versions to browsers that support them) Turnstile CAPTCHA system for registrations, logins, password reset, comments and/or third party plugins View Page rules, Cache rules, Firewall rules, IP Address rules, User Agent rules View Zero Trust Network Access setup View DMARC statistics Included tools: HTTP request trace, IP address details, domain details, WHOIS Directly cache HTML App for Cloudflare® can automatically cache your HTML pages at Cloudflare data centers in 330+ cities. “Standard” WordPress caching plugins can’t escape the laws of physics because information can’t travel faster than the speed of light (even if the page is cached, the cache exists on your physical origin server, which can be over 20,000 km from an end user). Caching content in Cloudflare data centers makes your website faster by putting your website cache closer to end-users (95% of the world’s population is within 50ms of a Cloudflare data center). This can be done without Cloudflare Workers or even a Page Rule (done with a single Cache Rule on Cloudflare’s side, and custom code in the plugin). Preload JavaScript and CSS Speed your site up by using the option that instructs browsers to preload JavaScript and CSS used to render the page being viewed. Can be used on its own, or in conjunction with Cloudflare’s Early Hints function. Manage all Cloudflare settings All Cloudflare settings can be changed directly within your WordPress admin area. Includes Easy config function that will optimally set your Cloudflare zone settings for WordPress. Fixes Cloudflare Flexible SSL redirect loops Automatically fixes HTTPS redirect loops when using Cloudflare’s Flexible SSL option (traffic between user and Cloudflare is encrypted, but traffic between Cloudflare and origin server is not). Handles user IP addresses Automatically handles the situation where your web server is passing Cloudflare IP addresses rather than the IP address of the user making the request. Turnstile CAPTCHA Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHA support for registration, login, password reset, comment forms, WooCommerce, Contact Form 7, HTML Forms, MetForm and/or WPForms. Single-click setup (done transparently via API call). Network analytics View network stats for your website directly within your WordPress admin area with a dashboard widget. View rules & firewall Quickly review your site’s Cloudflare rules and firewall settings from within your WordPress admin area. Includes: Page rules Cache rules Firewall custom rules IP address rules User agent blocking DMARC management Track third parties that are sending email on your behalf (for example an email provider you have authorized like Gmail or Outlook). You can also see unauthorized email senders or spammers sending email on behalf of your domain. Multisite network support You can have a network-wide Cloudflare API token that can be overridden on a per site basis. In the case where a multisite network operator has the site domains in a single Cloudflare account, they can allow the site users to use Cloudflare features for their individual site without disclosing the underlying API token. Additionally, a single Pro license for the main network site allows the media from all sites in the network to be stored in the cloud, within a single Cloudflare R2 bucket. Image Transformations Supports Cloudflare’s Image Transformation service, which allows Media images to automatically be served in the best format that a browser supports (AVIF, WebP, etc). Additionally, smaller images can be automatically served to users on very slow network connections. No web server configuration required. Store media in the cloud [Premium] Easily and seamlessly store your WordPress media in the cloud with Cloudflare R2. This allows you to offload resources (both bandwidth and disk space) from your server. The first 10GB is free, and only costs $0.015 per GB thereafter (ex. if you had 100GB of media, it would cost $1.35 per month to store it in the cloud). Includes the ability to migrate existing media from local filesystem to R2 (or from R2 to local filesystem). Works with individual media, or all media in bulk (includes web-based migration as well as a shell/WP-CLI option). Automatically convert uploaded images to AVIF or WebP This is done with a free companion plugin, Image Shift (includes the ability to apply watermarks). Protect admin area [Premium] Utilize Zero Trust Network Access to authenticate users before they access your WordPress admin area. Manage rules & firewall [Premium] The premium version unlocks the ability to manage (create, delete, suspend and unsuspend) Cloudflare rules and firewall definitions. In addition to defining your own rules, you can deploy useful rules with a single click: Block traffic from certain countries (or Tor exit nodes widely used by spammers and hackers) Block AI scrapers & crawlers (block bots from scraping your content for AI applications like model training) Force a challenge before users can register (bot/spammer mitigation) Cache static content Automatically block the IP address(es) of spammers for a period of time Backup & restore [Premium] You can backup and restore some of your most important Cloudflare configuration settings: Zero Trust Access Policies Firewall Rules Firewall IP Access Rules Firewall User Agent Blocking Page Rules Cache Rules Backups can be restored to different zones (for example if you had extensive configuration for a zone, you could give another zone the same configuration through a backup restore). Other features API calls are done exclusively through API Tokens (with the minimum required permissions) and not a Global API Key. Global API Keys are an incredibly bad idea from a security standpoint. Ability to purge Cloudflare cache from WordPress admin (or via WP-CLI). Ability to copy Cloudflare zone settings from a different zone on the same Cloudflare account. Cached pages are automatically purged when a post/page is edited (just the necessary pages, not all pages). Stale content is not served to users. Ability to designate an individual admin user to manage settings (maybe you don’t want all admins to have the ability to change things in Cloudflare). Ability to use WordPress filters to add your own logic to things (for example, maybe you don’t want to cache a certain page or post for whatever reason). All JavaScript is native (no dependencies on jQuery or anything else). No third-party PHP libraries used (no dependencies on other libs).

The award-winning Speed Optimizer plugin is a free WordPress performance-boosting solution to improve user experience, increase conversion rates and drive more traffic. Achieve better SEO rankings, improve Core Web Vitals and enhance your Google Page Speed Score. Developed by the WordPress speed experts at SiteGround, our free plugin is actively used and trusted by more than 2 million website owners. It’s specially designed to be easy to use, allowing users of all skill levels to make complex speed optimizations, such as minifying HTML, CSS and JavaScript, image compression and lazy loading, in a few clicks. Install our caching plugin now to dramatically improve your WordPress website performance on any hosting platform. Essential Speed-boosting Features: Powerful Caching for up to 20% faster website. Frontend Optimizations to minify JS, HTML and CSS, reducing wait time due to the number of scripts and characters in your code Media Optimizations by up to 85% image size compression without sacrificing quality WordPress Environment Optimizations to optimize usage and efficiency of your WordPress site resources Speed Test & tips to get on-demand optimization tips to help your site get even faster Don’t let a slow website compromise your online success. Join the millions of satisfied website owners and see the difference with the free Speed Optimizer plugin. AWARDS: Monster Awards 2022: Best WordPress Optimization Plugin 🥈 Plugin Video Plugin Tutorial To gain in-depth knowledge about our plugin and its functionalities, check our Speed Optimizer Tutorial. It provides detailed information on how to optimize each aspect of your site and maximizes your website performance and cache. CACHING The Caching page gives you full control of your website’s cache, allowing you to enhance its performance significantly. Take advantage of the powerful caching options available to boost your page speed: DYNAMIC CACHING: By enabling Dynamic Caching, all non-static resources of your website are intelligently cached, eliminating the need for repetitive database queries and enhancing page loading speed and TTFB (time to first byte). This default feature is available exclusively for SiteGround servers, ensuring optimal performance. FILE-BASED CACHING: By activating file-based caching, your website generates and stores static HTML versions, ensuring faster loading times and an improved user experience. This efficient caching method stores the cached files conveniently in the browser’s memory, allowing future visitors to access your site swiftly and seamlessly. MEMCACHED: Unleash the power of object caching for your WordPress website. Memcached revolutionizes website performance by storing frequently executed queries to your databases and reusing them for lightning-fast website results. This powerful feature is exclusively available in the SiteGround environment. CACHING SETTINGS: Automatic Cache Purge: ensure the cache is cleared whenever necessary Manual Cache Purge: purge cache manually if you are editing new material and do not have automatic purge activated. Browser-specific Caching: generate caching separately for different browsers Exclude Post Types from Caching: exclude specific post types from being cached Exclude URLs from Caching: exclude specific URLs or utilize wildcards to exclude any sub-pages of a designated “parent-page.” Test URL Caching Status: verify if dynamic caching is actively running on specific URLs ENVIRONMENT OPTIMIZATIONS Optimize and fine-tune your site’s environment for optimal website performance: HTTPS Enforce: Ensure a secure browsing experience for your visitors by effortlessly enabling HTTPS for your site. Say goodbye to insecure content errors and build trust with your audience. Scheduled Database Maintenance: Take control of your database by activating the Database Optimization feature. This functionality removes unnecessary items and optimizes your database tables, leading to improved efficiency and website performance. If you’re using the InnoDB storage engine, table optimisation is automatically handled by the engine itself. Heartbeat Control: Manage the frequency of the WP Heartbeat for different areas of your website. By default, the WordPress Heartbeat API checks for scheduled tasks every 15 seconds on post edit pages and every 60 seconds on the dashboard and front end. With Heartbeat Control, you can adjust the frequency of these checks or even disable them entirely, providing you with greater control over resource allocation. FRONTEND OPTIMIZATIONS Enhance and fine-tune the performance of your website’s front end by minifying JS, HTML and CSS: CSS Tab: Minify CSS files, activate or deactivate CSS combinations to reduce server requests, and even preload combined CSS for optimized performance. Additionally, you can exclude specific styles from being combined or minified, giving you complete control over your CSS optimization. JavaScript Tab: Activate or deactivate Minify JavaScript Files to reduce script sizes and lower the number of server requests. You can also defer render-blocking JavaScript to expedite the initial page speed. Furthermore, you have the ability to exclude specific scripts from various optimisation processes, providing flexibility in optimizing your JavaScript resources. General Tab: Further optimization options include: Web Fonts Optimization: Enhance the loading of Google fonts by adding a preconnect link in your head tag. This informs the browser to establish a connection to Google’s font repository as quickly as possible. Additionally, all other local fonts will be preloaded, resulting in faster caching and rendering. When combined with CSS Combination, we also modify the font-display property to improve rendering speed. Fonts Preloading: With locally hosted fonts being preloaded, you’re allowing browsers to cache and render them at an accelerated pace. Remove Query Strings from Static Resources: Improve caching efficiency by removing query strings from static resources, optimizing their caching capabilities. Disable Emojis: Prevent WordPress from detecting and generating emojis on your pages by disabling emojis support. This helps boost your page speed and improve your website performance. DNS Pre-fetch for External Domains: Enabling the DNS Pre-fetch for a domain will resolve it before resources from it get requested making those resources load faster. MEDIA OPTIMIZATIONS Optimize your website media by reducing image size by up to 85% times while maintaining top-notch quality. Image Compression: Effortlessly compress images to resize your existing images and reduce the space they occupy on your server. The dimensions of the images will remain unchanged, allowing for optimized storage. Fine-tune the compression level and choose whether to create backups of the original images. Please note that image compression feature is exclusive to the SiteGround Environment. WebP Images: Leverage the power of WebP, a cutting-edge image format supported by modern browsers, to significantly reduce the size of your images and skyrocket your page speed. If a browser doesn’t support WebP, the original images will be loaded. Lazy Load Media: Take control of your website’s asset loading with the ability to enable or disable Lazy Load for various assets. You can exclude specific assets such as iframes, videos, thumbnails, widgets, and shortcodes from the dropdown menu. Additionally, you have the option to exclude specific images from the Lazy Load by adding their respective class in the dedicated tab. Maximum Image Width: If you frequently upload large images to your website, you can enable the Maximum Image Width option that automatically resizes existing and future images whose width exceeds 2560 pixels. By optimizing image sizes, you can enhance your website performance and reduce bandwidth usage. You can customize your media optimisation to your specific needs using the filters, we’ve designed for this purpose. SPEED TEST Evaluate the optimization level of your website with Speed Optimizer’s Speed test tool. Our website performance check utilizes the robust capabilities of Google PageSpeed to provide comprehensive insights into your site’s optimization. By conducting the speed test, you will receive detailed results highlighting areas that can be further optimized for enhanced performance. These insights will empower you to fine-tune your website and unlock its maximum potential and increase conversions. Requirements In order to work correctly, this plugin requires that your server meets the following criteria: WordPress 4.7 PHP 7.0+ Our plugin uses a cookie in order to function properly. It does not store personal data and is used solely for the needs of our caching system. Data Collection Collection of technical data is optional and is listed here. This data is collected only for technical analysis, improvements and the possibility to contact the plugin user in case urgent issues need to be fixed (for example a critical security release that needs to be communicated to site owners). The plugin user can manage their preferences within the WP admin to control the collection of technical data. We advise opting in for this data collection, as it can enhance the plugin’s performance. You may find more information on data collection in our Plugins Privacy Notice. Credits Photo credits to Anna Shvets https://www.pexels.com/@shvetsa