Page size for Google

How big is too big?

[ken_b]

What is a good size for a page as far as Google is concerned? I've been reading here and used the search. But I'm confused.

I see folks mentioning Google likes small pages. But when I use Google to find sites in my field the pages can be HUGE and slow loading. Even home pages on top ranked sites.

I've always tried to shoot for loading in under 15 seconds at 28,800 for my site.

This lead me to think 40 - 50 K was tolerable, though larger than ideal.

Keep in mind that my site is mostly pics.

Right now I'm working on my homepage and it's at 31 K. I'd like to add a couple more small images, but that would surely bring it to 40 K or so.

Too big?

[ScottM]

Approx. 8k for my #4 listing.

No content whatsoever...just a simple link and some bold text on the page.

Very weird..

It was just a test to see if Google would pick it up...it did, and so I plan to add a lot of content...and then get advertisers.

By the way- I've had e-mails from pepole asking to advertise on that page!

[Macguru]

Hi ken_b,

I think regular search engine spiders won't load images, just the source code. So the size of the source only matters to them.

[ken_b]

Macguru;

Oh sure..... confuse me even more :)

So the page code size would be the 9 K I see for my page when I look at the file in my win98 explorer file manager, right?

[chiyo]

Well the reported size of our pages in the google index are the size of source code only PLUS, it seems, includes, but not graphics.

[ken_b]

Chiyo;

Thanks for the tip! That was easy enough to check out. That shows my current page at 10 K.

OK, I'm happy enough with that.

[discod]

And how much can Google cache?
I heard 101K in a similar discussion, but I'm not sure if they were referring to cacheing.

(Is "cacheing" spelled correctly?)

[Kaspian]

Pages only become too portly for Google's tastes when they eclipse the 100K mark. The file size of pictures added to a page won't increase the page size by the amount the picture is worth, it's only the source code that is looked at for page file size (as was mentioned earlier). Thank goodness for that, my site is VERY graphics intensive, so I'd be up a creek if it was any other way.

Basically, if you have a page that is 31K and you add a picture that is 10K in size, the page's file size won't become 41K, it'll only go up a wee, tiny little bit for however much data the line of code referencing the image is worth. I hope that makes sense to you Ken. :)

Edit: It's spelled "caching" I believe. :)

[Brett_Tabke]

Try a real common search: Food [google.com] (ok, so I've not had breakfast yet)

Starting at the top and working down:
35k
22k
3k
57k
13k
13k
10k
15k
1k
17k
41k
18k
8k
9k
14k
2k
16k

See the general pattern? (food isn't the best example, but it's there) The top PR value sites up near the top tend to get "passes" on page size (pr value trumps page size). As the pr value falls and relavance falls, so does the size of the page.

So, if you are a site with a pr4-pr7, aim for the smaller page sizes, as you will find your self showing up in the 5-10 range on the serps more often.

>That shows my current page at 10 K.

That's very good.

[soapystar]

yet a search for a very competitive term such as "travel" has the number one position at a massive 101k and all the top ten with big pages!

[austtr]

Those "food" figures provide some reassurance regarding small page sizes.

People only retain small parts of lengthy passages of text.. ie what they see as relevant. The rest becomes fluff which the brain discards. Combine that with the fact(?) that you have about 20 seconds to convince the viewer that this is a good site and worth further inspection, then there is a strong argument to have short, uncluttered, to the point, no bs home pages.

I have started following this line of logic and have been creating home pages with only about 70-80 words, keyword-rich naturally, but niggling in the back of my mind is the thought that I may not be providing enough search engine food to satisfy the SE's appetite.

Hopefully it will be.