How I can fix my slow-loading Wordpress blog?

Question

I have a Wordpress blog that is taking a full minute or more to load. When I load it on my computer, the status bar at the bottom of my screen says it's waiting for a specific IP address. It can take up to 45 seconds before it will move on to loading or waiting for something else. I know the time it takes my blog to load could drastically be reduced if I could figure out what is causing the blog to wait so long for that IP address.

Is there any way to find out why it's waiting on that IP address or what that even is? I do have some buttons and links on my homepage, and I am using a free theme, but I have no clue which one could be connected to that IP address (or if any of them are)...

Answer 1

I've heard a lot of scare stories concerning those "free" themes.

I think I'd try reverting to one of the wordpress themes, and see whether that solved the problem.



Then... If it was something else... I'd revert back, and try removing something else.... Or remove all the bells and whistles... and add them back one at a time.



Those buttons and weather aps and things all slow the site down, and some of those neat freebies work with conflicting java scripts.... Not much fun when the freebies don't play nice...

Answer 2

Normally, a WordPress site shouldn't be linking to outside IP addresses. The only free themes that you should use are those from the WordPress repository. If you didn't get it from there, I would scan your site with this online tool right away: http://sitecheck.sucuri.net/scanner/ This will tell you if you have any malware on your site.



If your site is clean, then most likely it's from a plugin. Install this plugin: http://wordpress.org/plugins/p3-profiler/ and run it. It will tell you which of your installed plugins or themes are taking the longest time to load. If you find a plugin that is REALLY taking forever, or if it's your theme, then uninstall or deactivate it and run the P3 plugin again to see if there's now a significant difference. You can also try switching your theme to twentytwelve and disabling ALL plugins except P3, then run it again and see what the difference is.



Lastly, and honestly most importantly, who is your host? Many shared hosts (like GoDaddy or DreamHost) host waaaay too many websites on their servers. Your site might be slowing down just because some other website is having major spikes in traffic and dropping your server access to zero. Look for local, or privately owned hosting companies or ask a developer (like me) who they'd recommend.

Answer 3

I think that is a problem for either your theme or hosting. So, I think, you should try out the following methods to try solving the problems.



Method 1: First try to change your theme to any other one. Then, test your load time. If it loads fast, your previous theme is the problem. Bad coding or queries could cause these problems. I recommend to use a premium theme where you will get lifetime supports from the theme creators.



Method 2: If the first method doesn't work, please contact your hosting provide. If he couldn't solve it, just move your site to another host. Then, try again. I think, you will be successful then. Please bear in mind, free or very cheap hosting could cause loading problems. As I use, I also recommend you to use HostGator once. I think, this is the best one to run a WordPress blog.

Answer 4

There are developer tools that will identify the network latency of objects loading.



Firefox browser with the Firebug Extension add on, look under the 'Net' tab to see all of the page elements and their respective load times.



If that's confusing, share the blog address and I'll be happy to tell you what element(s) are causing the delay.