Shopify Page Speed Optimization: How to Get a 95+ PageSpeed Score

Page speed isn’t just about user experience—it directly impacts your bottom line. For every 100ms delay in load time, conversion rates drop by 1%. If your Shopify store takes 3 seconds to load instead of 1 second, you’re losing 20% of potential sales.

Google also uses page speed as a ranking factor. Slow stores rank lower, get less organic traffic, and convert worse. It’s a death spiral.

Here’s how to fix it.

Why Most Shopify Stores Are Slow

Before we optimize, let’s understand the common culprits:

1. Bloated Themes

Premium themes come packed with features you’ll never use. Every feature adds CSS and JavaScript that must be downloaded, parsed, and executed—even if you don’t use it.

2. Too Many Apps

Each app adds another HTTP request, more JavaScript, and often slows down your entire store. We’ve seen stores with 20+ apps that take 8+ seconds to load.

3. Unoptimized Images

Product images are often uploaded at full resolution (4000x3000px) when they only need to display at 800x800px. That’s 25x more data than necessary.

4. No Code Splitting

Loading all JavaScript upfront—even for features only used on specific pages—wastes bandwidth and processing time.

The Optimization Framework

Here’s our proven process for achieving 95+ PageSpeed scores on Shopify:

Step 1: Audit Your Current Performance

Use Google PageSpeed Insights and WebPageTest to establish a baseline. Focus on these Core Web Vitals:

• LCP (Largest Contentful Paint): Should be under 2.5s
• FID (First Input Delay): Should be under 100ms
• CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift): Should be under 0.1

Step 2: Optimize Images

Images account for 50-70% of page weight. Here’s how to fix them:

Use the Right Format:

• WebP for photos (40% smaller than JPEG)
• SVG for logos and icons (infinitely scalable)
• AVIF for maximum compression (if browser supports it)

Implement Lazy Loading:

<img loading="lazy" src="product.jpg" alt="Product name">

Use Shopify’s Image CDN:

{{ product.featured_image | image_url: width: 800 }}

This automatically serves the right size for each device.

Step 3: Minimize JavaScript

JavaScript is the #1 performance killer. Here’s how to reduce it:

Remove Unused Apps: Audit every app. If you’re not actively using it, delete it. Each app adds 50-200kb of JavaScript.

Defer Non-Critical JS:

<script defer src="non-critical.js"></script>

Use Native Solutions: Instead of heavy jQuery plugins, use modern CSS and vanilla JavaScript. It’s faster and lighter.

Step 4: Optimize CSS

Critical CSS Inline: Inline the CSS needed for above-the-fold content. Defer the rest.

Remove Unused CSS: Most themes include hundreds of unused styles. Use PurgeCSS or manually remove what you don’t need.

Minify Everything: Use a build process to minify CSS, removing whitespace and comments. This can reduce file size by 20-30%.

Step 5: Leverage Browser Caching

Set long cache times for static assets:

Cache-Control: public, max-age=31536000, immutable

This means returning visitors load your site instantly.

Step 6: Use a CDN

Shopify includes a CDN, but you can optimize further:

• Use Cloudflare for additional caching
• Enable Brotli compression (smaller than gzip)
• Serve assets from edge locations closest to users

Advanced Optimizations

Once you’ve handled the basics, these advanced techniques can push you to 95+:

Preconnect to External Domains

<link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.gstatic.com">

Resource Hints

<link rel="prefetch" href="/next-page.html">
<link rel="preload" href="critical.css" as="style">

Code Splitting

Only load JavaScript for features that are actually used on each page.

Service Workers

Cache assets for offline access and instant repeat visits.

Measuring Success

Track these metrics weekly:

• PageSpeed Insights score (aim for 90+)
• Time to Interactive (aim for <3s)
• Total page weight (aim for <1MB)
• Number of requests (aim for <50)

Most importantly, track conversion rate. A 1-second improvement in load time typically increases conversion rate by 5-10%.

The 30-Day Challenge

Commit to improving your PageSpeed score by 10 points per week:

• Week 1: Optimize images
• Week 2: Remove unused apps and code
• Week 3: Implement caching and compression
• Week 4: Advanced optimizations and fine-tuning

Need Help?

Optimizing page speed requires technical expertise. If you’d rather focus on running your business while experts handle the technical work, get in touch. We guarantee 95+ PageSpeed scores on every store we build.

Remember: Fast stores don’t just rank better—they convert better, provide better UX, and ultimately make more money.