Why your website takes four seconds (and what I do differently)
Most local business websites load like an ox cart. It's not bad luck: it's how they're built.
Open any business website in your town on your phone and count: one, two, three… Go past two and a half seconds and half the people are no longer watching. And most local websites take four or more. It's not a curse — it's very specific causes, and every one has a fix.
the patience of whoever is looking for you, measured
2.5 s
the patience threshold
50%
leaves if you take longer
4 s+
how long most take
< 2.5 s
the workshop's threshold
The three usual causes
Cheap shared hosting — your website lives with thousands of pages on the same computer and suffers every neighbour's traffic jam.
Visual builders — they load the whole world even when the page only shows two sentences — megabytes of code to display an opening time.
Photos straight off the phone — heavy as stones, unresized and uncompressed.
What I do instead
Build by hand — with only what the page needs — no dragging the entire builder along.
Pre-render — the server doesn't think on each visit: the page already exists and travels from the network point closest to the visitor.
Images at the exact size — each screen receives only what it can show.
Interaction down to the minimum — so the experience feels alive without paying for it in seconds.
Speed isn't aesthetics. It's respect for the time of whoever is looking for you — and the first factor by which Google decides whether to show you or bury you.
Still have a question?
Write to me and I answer you myself. Gerard — Barcelona, reply within 24 hours.