Easy Critical CSS vs Asset CleanUp

Easy Critical CSS is a lightweight WordPress plugin that lets you add Critical CSS to any page on your site to improve loading speed and performance. Features: – Easily add Critical CSS and Secondary CSS to any page – Secondary CSS removes unused CSS rules and stylesheets, ensuring only a single optimized CSS file loads – Supports posts, pages, archives, and taxonomy pages – Fully compatible with caching plugins (WP Rocket, W3 Total Cache, WP Super Cache, etc.) – Customizable settings for individual pages – Stores Critical CSS in your choice of the database or as static files – Optional API service (API key required) for automated Critical and Secondary CSS generation via CriticalCSS.net – Background processing to generate CSS without blocking page loads or admin actions Why Use Critical CSS? Critical CSS ensures above-the-fold content loads first by reducing render-blocking CSS. This helps you boost Core Web Vitals, improve page speed scores, and deliver a better experience to your visitors. Want to try it out first? You can generate free one-off Critical CSS at CriticalCSS.net and manually apply it to your site using the plugin settings. External services This plugin interacts with external third-party services in order to provide its functionality. Below is a detailed breakdown of these interactions: Critical CSS API (api.criticalcss.net) This service generates critical and secondary CSS used to optimize your site’s CSS delivery and improve page load times. Data Sent: The URL, CSS generation preferences, generation status, and HTML content of pages from your website. When: Data is transmitted only if you have explicitly enabled the Auto generation mode, and occurs whenever Critical CSS or Secondary CSS needs to be generated or regenerated. Links: Terms of Service, Privacy Policy. Cloudflare API (api.cloudflare.com) This service is used to automatically clear your Cloudflare cache after new critical CSS is generated, ensuring your visitors see updated styles immediately. Data Sent: Authentication credentials (Cloudflare email, API key, and zone ID) and instructions for purging the cache. When: Data is sent only if CLOUDFLARE_EMAIL, CLOUDFLARE_API_KEY, and CLOUDFLARE_ZONE_ID are defined in your site’s configuration. Links: Terms of Service, Privacy Policy. Kinsta Cache Clear (localhost) If your site is hosted on Kinsta, this plugin can trigger a cache clear after generating new critical CSS, ensuring immediate availability of updated styles. Data Sent: A cache-clear request to your site’s local server endpoint provided by Kinsta. No sensitive or identifying information is transmitted beyond the local environment. When: Data is sent only when your site detects that it’s running on Kinsta infrastructure (KINSTA_CACHE_ZONE environment variable is present). Links: Kinsta Terms of Service, Kinsta Privacy Policy. Freemius API (api.freemius.com and wp.freemius.com) Used to manage licensing, validate API keys, and handle plugin updates and account management. Data Sent: Freemius sends and receives licensing information and plugin activation status, including your site’s URL, plugin version, API key, and licensing details. When: Data is transmitted only after explicitly opting in through the plugin’s settings page or upon activation of a purchased API key. By default, the plugin does not send any data to Freemius until you explicitly opt in. Links: Freemius Terms of Service, Freemius Privacy Policy.

WordPress themes and plugins often load CSS and JavaScript on pages that do not use them. A contact form may load on the homepage, a slider may load on a plain article, or store-related files may load outside the shop. Asset CleanUp shows you what each page loads and lets you unload what is not needed. This can reduce HTTP requests, page weight, and browser work while complementing your existing caching setup. Use Test Mode to validate changes as an administrator before they affect visitors. Asset CleanUp gives you precise, testable control over every optimization. A safer workflow, without giving up control The Dashboard keeps the technical detail experienced users need while guiding first-time users through Getting Started, Test Mode, and the central Overview page. Test changes before they affect visitors, then review and manage existing or leftover rules from one place. CSS and JavaScript management View loaded stylesheets and scripts, organized by their source. Unload unnecessary CSS and JavaScript on the homepage and on individual posts, pages, and custom post types. Manage assets from the Dashboard, the post/page edit screen, or the front-end view. Review unload rules, exceptions, asset attributes, page options, and leftover entries from the Overview page. Minify and combine supported CSS and JavaScript, including supported inline code. Preload selected CSS and JavaScript files when they need to be discovered earlier. Granular manual Critical CSS management Add, edit, and remove your own Critical CSS directly from the Dashboard. Keep manual CSS organized by supported page context instead of maintaining one large global block. Asset CleanUp does not automatically generate Critical CSS. It gives you a structured way to manage CSS that you prepare yourself. Fonts and resource loading Combine, preload, asynchronously load, or remove Google Fonts requests, with font-display and preconnect controls. Preload local font files and apply font-display. Add fetchpriority, loading, and decoding attributes to images using simple matching or regular expressions. Lazy-load images where appropriate. WordPress cleanup options Remove unused WordPress features such as Emojis, Dashicons for guests, and Comment Reply. Remove selected discovery links, metadata, and oEmbed resources from the document HEAD. Disable RSS feed links or feeds when they are not needed. Restrict or disable XML-RPC when your site does not rely on it. Strip supported HTML comments, with exceptions where required. Works with your caching setup, it does not replace it Asset CleanUp is not a page-caching plugin. It controls what WordPress outputs; a page cache, server cache, or CDN can then store and deliver the optimized result. After changing rules, clear every active cache layer. Avoid enabling the same minify or combine feature in multiple optimization plugins at the same time. Asset CleanUp Lite and Pro Lite includes page-level asset management, Test Mode, manual Critical CSS for supported contexts, resource-loading controls, and WordPress cleanup options. Go beyond individual CSS and JavaScript files with the Plugins Manager. Lite includes an interactive preview of the Plugins Manager (rules can be explored, but saved only in Pro). In Pro, it can prevent entire plugins from running on frontend or Dashboard pages where they are not needed, not merely remove their CSS and JavaScript. This can reduce PHP work, database queries, and potential conflicts before the page is generated. Asset CleanUp Pro also adds broader conditional rules, hardcoded asset management, device-specific rules, and advanced JavaScript attribute and placement controls. Documentation and support Read the Asset CleanUp documentation. Ask a question in the WordPress.org support forum. External Services and Privacy WordPress.org plugin icon service When an authorized administrator opens an Asset CleanUp Dashboard screen and the local plugin-icon cache is missing or incomplete, Asset CleanUp may request public plugin information from https://api.wordpress.org/plugins/info/1.2/. The request is used only to retrieve icons for active plugins displayed inside Asset CleanUp. It can include the corresponding WordPress.org plugin slugs and standard HTTP metadata, including the server IP address. Asset CleanUp does not intentionally include the site URL, administrator details, or site content. See the WordPress.org Privacy Policy. Google Fonts preload audit When an authorized administrator explicitly runs the Google Fonts preload audit, Asset CleanUp may request discovered Google Fonts stylesheets from https://fonts.googleapis.com/ and process font-file URLs from https://fonts.gstatic.com/. Requests can include the stylesheet URL and its font-family, variant, subset, or text parameters; the browser user-agent used by the audit; and standard HTTP metadata, including the server IP address. These requests are made only as part of the administrator-initiated audit. See the Google Privacy Policy. The following two Asset CleanUp-operated services are optional. Both are disabled by default and require an administrator to opt in from Asset CleanUp > Settings > Plugin Usage Preferences. Dashboard announcements When an administrator explicitly enables announcements, Asset CleanUp periodically requests the Asset CleanUp Lite announcements feed. The feed is used to show maintenance information, important update notices, optimization guides, and occasional product offers in the WordPress Dashboard. Asset CleanUp does not intentionally add the site URL, administrator details, or site content to this request. As with any HTTP request, the service receives the server IP address and standard HTTP metadata. When announcements are disabled, this feed is not requested. Optional usage tracking When an administrator explicitly enables usage tracking, Asset CleanUp sends an initial technical check-in and then no more than one check-in per week to the Asset CleanUp usage-tracking endpoint. The payload can include the PHP, WordPress, and Asset CleanUp versions; Asset CleanUp settings; first-use and review-notice state; server software; multisite status; the active theme name and version; active and inactive plugin file identifiers; and the WordPress locale. The site URL, administrator name, and administrator email are not intentionally included in the tracking payload. Disabling the setting stops future check-ins. The announcements and usage-tracking services are operated by the Asset CleanUp developer. See the privacy policy. CloudFront infrastructure is provided by Amazon Web Services and is also subject to the AWS Privacy Notice.