In OpenCart, speed optimization is very necessary as it would be annoying to have a slow-loading website.

There are many reasons that affect the site loading time such as poor OpenCart optimization and large volumes of products.

Generally, your website should load as fast as possible! Ideal website load time for mobile sites is 1-2 seconds. 53% of mobile site visits are abandoned if pages take longer than 3 seconds to load. A 2-second delay in load time resulted in abandonment rates of up to 87%.

Here at Ibmi Media, as part of our Server Management Services, we regularly help our Customers to perform OpenCart speed optimization.

In this context, we shall look into methods to perform OpenCart optimization to increase site speed.

How to Boost Up an OpenCart Website Speed?

OpenCart is an E-Commerce, open-source platform that makes online store management easier. 

Also, it allows OpenCart owners to customize their website which allows customers to buy products with few clicks.

However, a slow website does lose the customer because no one is willing to wait too long for a website to be loaded.

There are many factors that determine the OpenCart performance.

It includes:

i. Server resources.

ii. Theme.

iii. OpenCart modules.

iv. Caching.

How to increase OpenCart website performance?

1. Theme for OpenCart

Choosing a suitable theme for OpenCart is quite difficult, because it may be crucial for the success of a business. Many store owners try to include more features on their websites for better performance.

However, they may not understand it can only have a bad impact on the store speed.

Therefore, our Support Engineers only suggest a theme that is lightweight or feature-rich one.

How we change the theme in OpenCart

i. Initially, we download the theme that we want to use.

ii. Then we extract the files in the .zip file on the local computer.

iii. Next, we upload the extracted folder and its contents to the root directory of the OpenCart installation.

iv. We log into the OpenCart as the administrator. We select Extension >> Extension >> locate the store, and then we click the Edit icon under the Action.

v. Under General, in the Theme Directory list box, we select the new theme. Also, we mak the status as Enabled. And, we click the Save.

vi.  At last,  we go to System >> Settings >> "Store" Edit >> General. Finally, we click the Save button.

2. OpenCart modules for speed optimization

Also, many OpenCart extensions can be a reason for the slow OpenCart websites. When we add an extension to the OpenCart store, it also adds certain features along with it.

Sometimes, it makes database calls to perform their own functionalities and others need to load CSS, JavaScript files, images an so on.

So, we optimize CSS and images in the OpenCart.

Additionally, we ensure that the module compatible with multiple OpenCart versions.

3. Browser caching

Also, a large product website needs a speed-boosting OpenCart caching system. Luckily, a mod_expires module tells web browsers how long to cache certain types of content.

Here, we use the following steps to enable browser caching directives for OpenCart.

i. Initially, we login to the server as a root user and open the .htaccess file.

<IfModule mod_expires.c>
ExpiresActive On
ExpiresByType image/gif "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/jpeg "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/png "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType text/css "access plus 1 week"
ExpiresByType text/javascript "access plus 1 week"
ExpiresByType application/javascript "access plus 1 week"
ExpiresDefault "access plus 1 week"
</IfModule>

ii. Then, we save the changes.

4. Compression to improve OpenCart speed

The Apache mod_deflate module allows compressing the data on the websites. It helps to save bandwidth and improves page download times.

To enable the compression for OpenCart,  follow the steps given below.

i.  We login to the server as a root user.

ii. Then, we open the .htaccess file.

iii. Next, we add the following lines to the .htaccess file.

<IfModule mod_deflate.c>
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/css text/javascript application/javascript
</IfModule>

iv. We, save the changes to the .htaccess file.

5. Disk space for OpenCart

Again, one of the main things that affect website speed is enough disk space. If the server hasn't enough disk space to caching the file, it may reduce the page speed.

Therefore, ensure that you have a disk space of at least 10-15 GB for the cache.

[Need urgent assistance to optimize OpenCart Website?  We can help you.  ]