Are you tired of slow-loading websites? In today’s fast-paced world, where website speed is one of the most essential values contributing to Google ranking, you cannot avoid this if you are looking to grow your traffic.
That’s why today I will compare Perfmatters vs. Autoptimize, which are performance optimization plugins for WordPress that you can take advantage of in 2024.
Both plugins offer a range of features that will help you optimize your website. But which one is right for you?
Let’s take a closer look at the pros and cons of each plugin, which will help you decide what’s best for your site. So, let’s get started.
All About Perfmatters
Perfmatters is a popular WordPress optimization plugin that helps improve the loading speed of the website. Their parent company is Forgemedia LLC, and they have designed this plugin to help new website owners rank their websites better.
Let’s look at a few features provided by Perfmatters.
Features of Perfmatters
1. Script Manager
Perfmatters believes that the optimization of a website should not be complicated, and hence, they have created a simple and easy-to-use script manager. Using this script manager, you can just enable and disable various options using toggle buttons.
For example, if you do not want emojis to load on every web page or other element that you do not want to use on a regular basis, you can disable them with just one click. This reduces your overall HTTP requests, making your web page size smaller and, hence, easier to load.
2. Asset Loading Control
You can control the loading of assets such as CSS and other JS files. If you want them to load asynchronously, you can optimize the order as well as the timing of asset loading. This enhanced the website’s performance.
3. Lazy Loading
If you are a professional website owner, you must be aware of the concept of lazy loading. It delays your loading request for images and videos until it is needed.
This feature is useful for a website that uses videos and images on a larger volume. Tests show that websites can cut load times by more than 30% when they use lazy loading.
4. Database Optimization
Over time, you don’t realize it, but your website can collect more than hundreds and thousands of databases that you don’t use regularly. For example, revisions of old posts, pages, custom post types, and WP spam comments.
Which is why you need to optimize them regularly. But with the growing website, you might not find time to do so manually.
This is why Perfmatters can easily clean and delete old and unused data, making your site lighter.
You can also schedule an automatic database optimization on a daily or weekly basis as per your requirements.
Pricing and Plans
Perfmatters comes with three different pricing plans – Personal, Business, and Unlimited Sites.
All three plans are designed to cater to different requirements and budgets. If you are starting your website new, then I would recommend you go for the Personal plan, which will cost you $24.95 per year. With that, you also get 1 year of support and updates.
But if you have more than 1 website to optimize, take their Business or Unlimited sites plan. Business will come at $54.95 per year and Unlimited websites will cost you $124.95 per year.
Additionally, when you redeem our exclusive Perfmatters discount code, you can save up to 20% on any Perfmatters pricing plan.
Another important thing to note is that they have a 30-day money-back policy. Under this policy, if you are not satisfied with their service and want to quit, you will be given your money back with no questions asked.
Of course, the team will try to give you better options and help you out with any technical problem you might be facing, but the final decision will always be yours. All you have to do for a refund is register a ticket on their website, and their team will reach out to you.
Pros and cons
Pros
- Easy to use with no coding, designed for beginners
- Excellent support staff
- Affordable and worth the price
- A must-have for WordPress users looking to seriously optimize their site
- lightweight plugin and easily integrable with other plugins and tools
- A/B multivariate testing for better results
Cons
- No lifetime plan as of now
All About Autoptimize
Autoptimize is a performance optimizer for websites. They do it by minifying CSS and JS files. You also get various advanced features in the pro version of Autoptimize, such as HTML page caching, image optimization, CDN integration, and automatic critical CSS rules.
While the free version of this plugin does not offer support, their expert support can be accessed in their paid pro version.
Autoptimize is designed for more streamlined code optimization and not for caching. In my personal experience, they are a good tool if you are looking for something to use for free. Let’s see some of the features of Autoptimize.
Key features
1. Minification
Minification is the process of optimizing your website by removing unnecessary codes from the database. This, when done for a longer period, can impact your website performance.
But you won’t be able to see their effect quickly. Therefore, I would recommend you backup your website before using this plugin and wait for a few months to test its efficiency properly.
2. Aggregation
This plugin can aggregate and move stylesheets to the top of web pages. This helps reduce the number of HTTP requests and hence decreases the weight of your website.
3. Deferred Loading
Deferred loading may sound the same as lazy loading but it is distinctly different. Deferred loading means loading images and videos after loading the initial page, making the user see the initial view faster.
Lazy loading, on the other hand, works on the concept of “Do not work until you absolutely have to”. Lazy loading is a much broader concept.
Using Autoptimize, you can delay the loading of noncritical JS files until the initial page fully loads.
4. Compatible and Integration
Autoptimize is compatible with other plugins and tools such as WP Rocket, Perfmatters, and more.
Pricing and Plans
Autoptimize offers their users 2 different types of prices – Single site and 5 sites.
Both plans offer all the basic and advanced features, such as image optimization, CDN, caching, CSS optimization, and support. The single-site license can be obtained at the cost of $11.99 per month or $79 per month.
You can obtain 5 sites at $31.99 per month or $299 per year.
So far, they do not have any option for unlimited sites or a lifetime plan for their users.
They also provide new booster options to their users, such as delaying JS or HTNL. This booster option will significantly impact and improve performance for visitors clicking on other pages on your site.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Minification and compression of HTML, CSS, and JS files
- SEO improvement by reducing HTML request
- Compatible with other hosts and tools
- Aggregation and script management by providing various booster options
- A free version is also available
Cons
- No AB testing to achieve the best results
- No support in the free version
Comparison – Perfmattters VS Autoptimize
A. Performance impact
Perfmatters
Perfmatters is designed to improve website performance by reducing HTML requests by disabling features that are not used regularly.
When you compare this plugin with another speed optimizer, such as WP Rocket, you can easily make a significant impact on the loading speed of your web pages. The best part is you can easily see the result almost instantly after plugging this into your website.
Also, script manager and other optimization features can help you decrease the overall volume or size of the website. It is also easy to use without knowing coding.
Autoptimize
On the other hand, Autoptimize helps you minify CSS, JS, and HTML files. You can also defer loading on some noncritical files which are not used regularly.
The plugin is known for being reliable and optimizing, leading to improved website performance. But once you plugin this, you might have to wait a few days or even months to see an impact on the overall performance of the website.
To sum up, both Perfmatters and Autoptimize can help make a website run faster. People like Perfmatters because it optimizes quickly and well, and they also like Autoptimize because it is reliable in reducing the size of CSS and JavaScript files.
Which one to choose may rely on the needs of your website and how well it works with other plugins.
B. Ease of use
From my personal experience, I can say that both Perfmatters and Autoptimize have beginner-friendly interfaces. But Autoptimize is a bit hard to understand at first, but with time, you get used to it.
Perfmatters also acts as an all-in-one solution for caching and optimizing plugins. Autoptimize, on the other hand, gives you a free plan with booster options, but it may not be an all-in-one solution, requiring a functional caching plugin for WordPress.
C. Compatibility with other plugins
Both Perfmatters and Autoptimize are compatible when it comes to integrating with various hosts and tools. The best way to optimize your website is to use Perfmatter along with WP Rocket for enhanced optimization.
You can also use another optimization tool, such as FlyingRocket and others with Perfmatter.
Autoptimize is compatible with other caching plugins, making it a great choice for users looking to enhance their pages. You can use Smerush, Ahrefs, and more while using Autoptimize.
D. Pricing and value for money
When it comes to pricing, Perfmatters is a better option. You can get everything from disabling unused features to lazy loading and image optimization at just $24 per year. The Autoptimize pro version can be accessed at $11.99/month for a single site and $31.99 per month for five sites.
So, if you are on a tight budget and looking for an optimization tool, perfmatters is the one you should go for.
Conclusion
The choice between Perfmatters and Autoptimize comes down to what your website needs. Perfmatters is praised for how well it works, how easy it is to use, and how helpful its customer service is. This makes it easy for even beginners to use.
Autoptimize, on the other hand, has a free plan and is known for quickly and reliably making CSS and JavaScript files smaller and more efficient.
Each app does something different well, and both can help your website run faster. Because of this, the choice should be based on the unique needs and how well the plugins work with other website tools and plugins.
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