Why speed matters · Ecommerce
Faster stores
sell more.
Every second a product page takes to load, shoppers leave. Here is what the research says, where a slow store loses money, and what a faster one could be worth to you.
retail conversions from a 0.1s faster mobile site[1]
chance a visitor bounces as load time goes from 1s to 3s[2]
conversion rate for Rakuten 24 in a speed-only A/B test[3]
sales for Vodafone after a 31% faster largest paint[4]
Third-party research, linked below. Results vary by site.
The short answer
Does site speed affect ecommerce sales?
Yes. Faster pages keep more shoppers on your store and turn more of them into customers. In a Deloitte study of mobile sites, making pages just 0.1 seconds faster lifted retail conversion rates by 8.4%, and controlled tests by Rakuten 24 and Vodafone saw sales rise when only page speed changed.
The cost of waiting
Where a slow store loses money
The first click
Shoppers arriving from an ad, an email or a search result decide in seconds. If the page is still blank, many hit back before they see a single product, and you have already paid for that click.
Browsing and search
Every category page, filter and search result is another wait. Slow browsing means fewer product pages viewed, and fewer chances for something to catch their eye.
The product page
This is where the decision happens. Deloitte found faster mobile sites lifted product-page to add-to-basket progression by 9.1%. Slow images and layout jumps get in the way of that moment.
Mobile shoppers
Most store traffic is on phones, often on patchy connections. Heavy themes and app scripts hit mobile hardest, which is exactly where the research measured the biggest gains.
Calculator
What could faster pages be worth to you?
Put in your own numbers. Even a small lift in conversion adds up across a year of traffic.
Pick a lift you believe. For scale, Deloitte measured +8.4% retail conversions from a 0.1 second faster mobile site.
An illustrative estimate from your inputs, not a promise.
The target
How fast is fast enough?
Google’s Core Web Vitals are the standard yardstick. They also feed into Google’s page experience signals, and landing page experience is part of every Google Ads Quality Score, so a faster store can rank better and waste fewer paid clicks.
Largest Contentful Paint
How long until the main content, usually your hero image or headline, has loaded.
Interaction to Next Paint
How quickly the page responds when a visitor taps or clicks.
Cumulative Layout Shift
How much the layout jumps around while it loads.
How Mirra helps
A faster store, without a rebuild.
Mirra captures your live store and serves a pre-rendered copy from Cloudflare’s global edge on your own domain. Shoppers get pages that are ready the moment they ask, and your platform, cart and checkout keep working as they do today.
FAQ
Speed and sales, answered.
How much does a one second delay cost an online store?+
It depends on your traffic and margins, but the direction is consistent. Google found the chance of a visitor bouncing rises 32% as load time goes from one to three seconds, and Deloitte saw retail conversions rise 8.4% from a 0.1 second improvement. Use the calculator on this page with your own numbers for a rough idea.
Does site speed affect Google rankings?+
Yes, as one signal among many. Core Web Vitals, Google’s measures of loading, responsiveness and visual stability, are part of its page experience signals. Speed will not outrank relevance, but between similar pages a faster one has an edge.
Does site speed affect my ad costs?+
It can. Landing page experience is one of the three parts of a Google Ads Quality Score, and a slow page wastes clicks you have already paid for because people leave before it loads.
How fast should my ecommerce site be?+
Aim for Google’s “good” Core Web Vitals thresholds: the largest element on screen loaded within 2.5 seconds, a response to taps and clicks within 200 milliseconds, and a layout shift score under 0.1, measured on real mobile visits.
What slows an online store down?+
Usually heavy theme code, apps and plugins that each add their own scripts, marketing and chat tags, large images, and pages rendered on every request instead of served ready-made. Mirra serves a pre-rendered copy of your pages from the edge, which removes most of that wait.
Make your store fast.
See a faster copy of your own pages next to your live site, before you pay anything.