Keeping page size down

...down how far?

[enchant]

In some instructions by Brent, he advises to keep page size down under 15k. Under 12k is better, and under 10k is even better. That works fine if you're posting a white paper, but for most of us, this is a multi-media medium, with decoration and photos to illustrate a point.

My clients love the websites I build for them. Their customers regularly comment to them on how attractive and easy to navigate the sites are.

But the vast majority of pages that I design typically have 50k - 80k of images alone. These days (2006), I honestly don't think that this is at all unusual OR in any way a bad thing.

So I guess my question is this... Does Google still prefer sites that are 15k over sites that are 25k? Is this an outdated rule? This seems to me to be an absurd method of selection. Isn't the objective to return the most appropriate and helpful results based on the search terms? If I search for "Travel Bahamas", I don't want a page of black text on a white background.

[synergy]

I think you should figure your page size in terms of no images... I don't think the spiders read and load images like a webrowser does... they only see code and text.

The key for humans is to use images in a strategic manner, such as 1px tiled images to create your website layout (or no images at all, thanks to css).

The key for spiders is using CSS to keep page size down. Get rid of all non-essential styling HTML tags and put them into CSS. No tables, no font tags, nothing that styles the document. This minimizes "code bloat".

For more information, see [searchengineworld.com...] -- "It is not easy an easy task to reduce page size, but I try to keep all pages under 20k of html, and less than 30k total with graphics."

P.S. It's "Brett", not "Brent" :-)

[rliddle]

I would add you can put your images in background CSS and they do not show up under page size. 6k and 7k pages are doable this way.

[tedster]

You asked if Google still "prefers" pages that are 15k compared to 25k. This was only, ever a rule of thumb based on observed patterns -- not some intentional edict issued by Google or hard coded into their algorithm. I think Google today is a lot looser because there so MANY factors being taken into account.

Still, it's always a good discipline to keep the html as minimal as you can without distorting the presentation of your content. But don't worry about exact file size numbers, just do right by your content and make sure visitors get as fast a page as you can.

With a little attention, you can almost always make your pages faster than others in your market. The range of sizes can vary widely from one topical area to another, but faster than "others like you" is all you need to gain an edge.

[Crush]

You know these days from my stats most people are buying from work on a company network. This conversation was more relevant a few years ago whem lots of people were on dial up. Anyone still use dial up?

[enchant]

> I think you should figure your page size in terms of no images... I don't think the spiders read and load images like a webrowser does... they only see code and text.

Oh... In that case, nevermind. My file sizes, with few exceptions, are between 8-12k.

> P.S. It's "Brett", not "Brent" :-)

Doh! I've been watching a lot of "Corner Gas".

[zafile]

"Anyone still use dial up?"

See

[usatoday.com...]

and

[bizreport.com...]

[trinorthlighting]

I get a lot of customers who still use dial up. Keeping the page size down helps a lot.