WP Rocket Review: Speed Up Your WordPress Website [Easily!]

In today's fast-paced digital world, having a super-fast website is crucial. In this WP Rocket Review, we'll see if it can be the solution you need.

We'll also talk about the importance of website speed and how WP Rocket can help your website reach new heights. Keep reading!

Disclosure: This website uses affiliate links; I may earn commissions at no extra cost to you. Learn more.

Importance Of Website Speed & Performance

If you visit a website, and it takes forever to load. You'll be frustrated, right?

That's why the website speed matters. It's about a better user experience for your visitors and customers!

Everyone wants everything as fast as possible nowadays. Thanks to our ever-so-shrinking attention span and patience.

Slow websites lead to a higher bounce rate and damage everything.

Search engines like Google also care about speed. Faster sites rank higher, while slow ones are buried at the deep end of the search engine result pages.

And beyond user experience and SEO, speed also affects conversions and customer satisfaction rates which is far more important for any business.

A one-second delay can decrease your conversions significantly, but speed, on the other hand -- boosts satisfaction and engagement rate.

That's where a product like WP Rocket becomes so useful and necessary. Let's talk about it.

What Is WP Rocket?

If you're looking to boost your WordPress website's speed and make it load faster, WP Rocket is what you need!

You know how important website speed is, right? I mean, when I visit a site, I want it to load instantly after every click! No waiting around for ages.

And that's exactly what WP Rocket does for you. It's like having a speed booster for your site in the form of a WordPress plugin!

On top of user experience, website speed is also very crucial for your search engine rankings. So it's something you cannot ignore.

Also, WP Rocket is not only a speed booster but it helps you to optimize almost everything you'd need to optimize for the success of your website.

For example, it will also help you to improve your Google Core Web Vitals which is a necessity at this point. And that too without putting much effort.

When you install the WP Rocket plugin on your website, it creates super-fast and optimized static versions of your pages, so that when someone visits your website, it is ready to load in an instant.

No more waiting for the server to generate pages on the spot and staring at the loading sign.

And also, not to mention that, it also reduces the server load and saves you a ton of money on that front as well.

It also automatically squishes your CSS, JavaScript, and HTML files, making them smaller and faster to load. It is called minifying or minification in the technical term.

And as if that was not enough! You can also use it to combine multiple files into one to reduce the number of requests made to the server. Smart, right?

Apart from that, it also helps you with lazy loading, image optimization, database optimization, and a lot more.

So, in a nutshell, WP Rocket is a WordPress caching and optimization plugin that is like a turbo boost for your website's speed. Click here to give it a try!

Features Of WP Rocket

Now let's discuss the key features of the WP Rocket plugin that contribute to achieving excellent performance in WordPress website speed optimization.

Starting with...

User Interface & Experience

WP Rocket is one of the most easy-to-use WordPress caching and optimization plugins in the market. The interface is very intuitive and everything is self-explanatory for most people.

Some may need to learn about the advanced settings but they have designed it in a way that anyone can use it and optimize their website with just a few clicks.

Don't like too many options? Do they confuse you? Simply use their automatic optimizing settings and you're good to go.

And on the other hand, if you're like me who goes through every single setting and does things manually, you can do that too!

If I had to rank it with its competitors based on user interface and experience, it will be my number one choice. The closest one would be the NitroPack plugin which is way more expensive compared to WP Rocket.

No complaints but only praises when it comes to the UI and UX of WP Rocket.

Page Caching

Page caching is a key feature of WP Rocket or any other WordPress caching plugin. This feature creates static HTML versions of your web pages and saves them on your server.

And when someone visits your website, the plugin shows them the cached HTML version of the page instead of generating it on the go.

Without it, not only your server cost will rise but also reduce your website speed significantly.

The page caching feature makes things work faster, which results in quicker page loads, less strain on the server, and a lot of savings that you can utilize somewhere else.

Browser Caching

This feature as the name suggests, tells your visitors' browser to keep certain static files such as CSS, JavaScript, and images on their devices locally for a specific period of time.

So, when the visitor comes back to your website or checks out some other pages, the cached files load from their device instead of downloading them again from the server.

This makes things faster and reduces the load time of your website for repeated or subsequent visits.

The easiest example will be the logo. It doesn't have to load for every page visit. You can take care of things like this with the help of WP Rocket.

Cache Preloading

Normally the page cache is created when someone visits your website or requests a page. This results in a slower website until all the pages are cached properly for all the versions of the page or geo-locations.

But with WP Rocket's cache preloading feature, you can preload the website's cache and keeps your website's cache up-to-date.

This means every time someone visits your website, it will always load a cached static version of the page which will load faster.

This feature allows you to crawl your site automatically, following links and caching pages in the background, and gets rid of the delay a user might experience when they access a page for the first time after its cache has expired.

Minifying & Combining Files

Making your website faster is not only about optimizing your pages and caching them. You also need to optimize your CSS and JavaScript files. And yeah, also the HTML which is basically your web pages.

With WP Rocket, you can take your file optimization to the next level with its minification and file combining feature.

Minification is a process to make your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files smaller by removing unnecessary spaces, line breaks, comments, etc.

A smaller file size means a faster-loading website, and that's what it aims for.

On the other hand, combining multiple CSS and JavaScript files into one reduces the number of requests made to your server, which results in less delay and thus makes your website load quicker.

It's like having a shortcut to faster performance!

File Loading Management

You can also control how your files load when a page is requested or someone visits your website. Here's how it works and what you need to keep in mind:

Deferred Loading:

In simple terms, it is delaying non-essential files when someone visits your website. For example, there's no need to load ads or social share buttons if you have them.

With this feature, you can choose to load non-essential CSS and JavaScript files after the initial page rendering which results in a faster website and also a better Google Core Web Vital score.

It allows the primary or important content to appear quickly, making your website feel faster to visitors even though the page is not loaded completely.

Asynchronous Loading:

As the name suggests, this feature allows you to load JavaScript or even CSS nowadays asynchronously.

If you don't know what that means, it's just loading in the background without hampering the web page rendering process when someone visits your website.

Google Adsense script for example uses asynchronous loading so that it doesn't hamper the user experience and the website feels faster.

You can choose to do the same with the scripts on your website using this feature from a single dashboard.

Inline CSS & JavaScript:

With WP Rocket, you also have the ability to inline your CSS and JavaScript files wherever it makes sense.

In my opinion, it's mostly helpful in landing pages and some other standalone pages that don't share the same code as the rest of the website.

However, it can be very handy depending on your situation throughout the website.

Inlining CSS and JavaScript means a lot fewer HTTP requests which means there will be next to no delay when it comes to server response resulting in a faster website.

There is more to talk about file loading management but let's get going to keep it short...

Lazy Loading

This is also related to file loading management but  I wanted to talk about it separately because it's a unique feature as it is visible on the front-end for everyone.

You may have already seen it on most of the websites you visit including this one.

Lazy loading is basically a clever technique that WP Rocket uses to improve the page loading and user experience.

With lazy loading, images, videos, and other media files load only when you scroll down the page, and not all at once during the initial load.

There's no point in loading things that are not visible to you immediately. This feature allows you to do that with just a click in the settings dashboard.

This speeds up the page and reduces data usage, especially for image-heavy pages.

Database Cleanup & Optimization

This is a nifty feature called that does wonders for your website's performance.

It acts like a detective, finding unnecessary stuff in your WordPress database and clearing out things like old post revisions, trashed posts, and spam comments – all that extra baggage that slows things down.

Apart from that, it also optimizes your database tables to make them more efficient resulting in snappier and more responsive.

You can also choose to enable the automatic cleanup option if you'd like to. No need to worry about doing it manually every once in a while!

With the Database Cleanup & Optimization feature, your website will be ready to load in an instant!

WooCommerce / eCommerce Optimization

If you run an online store with WooCommerce, WP Rocket has a special treat for you! Its WooCommerce Optimization feature is here to make your store lightning-fast and super efficient.

With it, even your cart and checkout pages get cached in a smart way that allows smoother and quicker transactions for your customers.

Apart from that, lazy loading ensures that product images only load when your customers scroll down to see them. It saves time and data, making the shopping experience more enjoyable.

Not to mention that all the features and optimization help you to make more sales and more profit. If you haven't started using it already, you should get started now!

GZIP Compression

GZIP Compression might sound like a big word, but it's actually a simple yet powerful feature in WP Rocket that makes your website faster!

I'm guessing you already know what compression is but if not, it's like zipping up the files to make their size smaller.

The GZIP compression allows you to squeeze your files, like CSS and JavaScript, into smaller sizes which means they take up less space and load faster.

It's a win-win for both your visitors and your server as it reduces the amount of data transferred and saves your precious server resources.

Almost all the hosting providers allow it nowadays as it is very effective. Try it out and see the difference!

DNS Prefetch

In simple terms, DNS Prefetch is like having a map for a faster journey!

When a visitor comes to your website, their browser needs to find the server where your website is stored. The process involves what is called DNS Lookup.

The DNS Prefetch feature helps you to speed up this process by looking up the server's address in advance, even before the visitor clicks on a link.

This means faster page loads and less waiting time for your visitors. At least on the DNS Lookup front.

With this feature, you get a faster DNS lookup for your visitors, and your website becomes more user-friendly.

And although it will be less than a second, every millisecond helps when you're trying to improve your website's speed.

Content Delivery Network (CDN) Integration

If you have a website, you might have heard of a CDN. It's like a network of servers that keeps copies of your website in different parts of the world.

This way, when someone visits your site, they don't have to wait for it to load from your origin server which not only reduces the server load but also results in a faster website.

A CDN makes sure your visitors get your website from the closest server to them, and not from your main server which may be located in a different part of the world.

With WP Rocket you connect your website to any CDN you're using, like StackPath.

They even have their own CDN called Rocket CDN, though I haven't tried it myself yet.

At the moment, I use Cloudflare as my CDN, and it works seamlessly with WP Rocket. No issues at all!

And whatever CDN you're using, chances are it will work smoothly with that too.

Google Core Web Vitals Optimization

What are Core Web Vitals? They are specific factors Google uses to measure your website's user experience. Things like loading speed, interactivity, and visual stability.

While this is not a feature really but WP Rocket helps you to improve your Google's Core Web Vitals score.

Almost all the features contribute to it but I'm talking about this separately because people specifically ask me if there's a feature to improve Google's CWV score whenever I recommend WP Rocket to them.

Google loves websites that provide a top-notch user experience and by optimizing your Core Web Vitals with WP Rocket, you're likely to get a little SEO boost, which means better search engine rankings for your website.

So, with WP Rocket's Google Core Web Vitals Optimization, you're set to impress both your visitors and Google's algorithm.

Image Optimization (Not A WP Rocket Feature)

Now let's talk about image optimization. Unfortunately, It's not a built-in feature in WP Rocket. But it's certainly a necessary one!

The same team from WP Rocket also owns the image optimization plugin called Imagify which you can use on your website for this purpose.

An image optimization plugin provides several features such as compressing your images, converting them into a better-optimized format, dynamically reducing quality based on internet speed, etc.

And as you can imagine, it creates a huge impact on your website's load time. So I wouldn't recommend ignoring this aspect of speed optimization.

Personally, I'm using Optimole on all of my websites at the moment and it is great. You can choose whatever you want, but use something and aid your website speed optimization efforts.

Addons

Apart from all the features, WP Rocket also has the following add-ons that you can use on your website in case you need them.

• Varnish Cache
• Cloudflare Integration
• Sucuri Integration

Now of course that's not all. It has many other features or settings that I didn't talk about here to keep the article at an optimal length.

If you want to learn more about WP Rocket, click here.

Pros & Cons Of WP Rocket

No matter how good a product is, it almost always has at least one downside to it. WP Rocket is not different in this case.

Let's have a look at the pros and cons of WP Rocket so that you can decide for yourself if it's a good fit or not. Here we go...

There you have it!

So what do you think? Ready to roll with it? If so, click here!

Pricing Plans Of WP Rocket

As of the moment, WP Rocket offers three different plans in terms of the number of websites you're allowed to use it on.

All of their plans are annual plans which means it renews every year and you're eligible for the support and updates for as long as your license is active.

Here's a simple pricing table for you to get an idea:

Please note that pricing details may change overtime, so it's best to check WP Rocket's official website for the latest pricing details.

My Opinion On The Pricing Plans

I think WP Rocket's plans are a bit expensive, except for the Infinite plan. The Single and Plus plans don't make any sense to me.

If you have more than one website, the Single plan won't fit your needs.

And the Plus plan might be okay for some people, but it's better to increase your budget and go for the Infinite plan, as it offers more value for the cost.

The first two plans feel like they're just there to upsell you the Infinite plan.

The best way to use your money is to get the Infinite plan and share the cost with your friends and/or other WordPress website owners.

That's what I did for my client's websites and with my friends in the blogging community.

The Plus plan would be better if it allowed for up to 5 websites without increasing the cost.

The numbers themselves are not that big, but considering what you get, I feel it's a bit expensive.

You can get almost everything it offers for free nowadays. Try the Litespeed Cache plugin for example.

Also, many hosting providers offer their own premium-level caching plugins for free with their hosting. The best example of this would be the SG Optimizer.

To sum it up, I'd recommend WP Rocket only if your website makes enough money to justify the expense. Otherwise, you can stick to the free caching plugins available in the WordPress repository or provided by your hosting.

No hate for WP Rocket, though! I really love it, but I want to be honest with you guys!

Are you ready to spend on it?

Frequently Asked Questions

Now let's have a look at some of the frequently asked questions about WP Rocket and of course, I'm going to answer them for you:

There you go! Now you have all the answers about WP Rocket. If you're ready to speed up your website, click here to get started!

My Personal Experience

While this whole article is based on my personal experience and the important information that I needed to convey, let's talk about it more without the extras.

I was waiting to try it almost since I began using WordPress for my blogs and website. I tried it for the first time in 2021.

Before this, I was using the official caching plugin of SiteGround hosting called SG Optimizer which is also awesome by the way.

But WP Rocket is definitely better!

I even recorded a video of my first experience with the plugin and the interface. I will include it below but fair warning that it's a bit old video and I cringe at it, to be honest.

Over time I have learned a lot obviously but I sound like an idiot here. However, it's good enough to get an overview of the plugin and my first experience with it.

If you're ready to deal with it then here you go:

Back then, I felt uncomfortable making videos, so I didn't make more of it. But I extensively tested WP Rocket and used it for a long time.

At first, I was confused by the results, but later, everything fell into place. Understanding all the settings took some time, but it was easy enough.

Compared to other caching plugins I've tried, WP Rocket is the easiest to use, packed with advanced features.

So far I've used SG Optimizer, Breeze, W3 Total Cache, WP Super Cache, WP Fastest Cache, NitroPack, Litespeed Cache, and WP Rocket.

Some were simple but lacked important features, while others were feature-rich but not user-friendly.

On the other hand, some plugins such as Litespeed Cache have all the features you'd want but is not so beginner friendly.

Currently, I'm using Litespeed Cache, which is great for Litespeed-enabled servers but not so beginner-friendly.

It's way more complex compared to any other plugins but they're working on it to simplify things for non-technical users.

Now to get back to the WP Rocket plugin, some of you might face certain issues while enabling certain settings such as combining JavaScript files.

I would highly recommend testing all the settings individually so that you can pinpoint what's causing the issue on your site.

Fortunately, I didn't have any issues, but it's common, so test your site well before committing to it.

Honestly, I don't have any complaints, except for the pricing. The individual license is expensive, and the Plus plan feels like an upsell.

So that's it. It's the only thing that I can complain about at the moment.

Otherwise, WP Rocket is the best WordPress caching and optimization plugin out there in the market and you should definitely try it out as soon as possible!

Final Verdict

To conclude, WP Rocket is one of the best WordPress caching and performance optimization plugins available in the market right now. It has everything you'd need, plus a lot more.

It is a highly effective and user-friendly solution for optimizing WordPress websites for a better load time. The interface is definitely the best one, and it is easy to use as well.

Now easy does not mean it doesn't have any advanced features. In fact, it has all the features that you'd need to make your WordPress website optimized for speed and better user experience.

It is undoubtedly one of the best investments for WordPress users seeking improved website speed and performance.

On top of all that, it is also compatible with all of your favorite themes and plugins that you're probably using on your WordPress website or you're planning to use in the future.

However, we all know that no matter how good a WordPress theme or plugin is, you're most likely to face some sort of issue once in a while. That's where the support team comes in handy and WP Rocket has got your back.

So there's nothing to worry about.

So, if you're tired of your slow-loading website? If it's costing you, your visitors, potential leads, and revenue. It's time to take action now and skyrocket your website's performance with WP Rocket.

And of course, your revenue will skyrocket too! Get started with WP Rocket today!