A recent thread in a Facebook group for a specific WordPress Plugin (Learn Dash) led to some interesting conversation. Specifically, was this plugin causing slow load times for users?
I had noticed some issues with this very site, and previously I had run tests and saw issues with the Learn Dash plugin. However, I wanted to find out (semi-definitively) if it was this plugin or not. And if updates to the plugin as well as WordPress had changed anything.
I used the P3 (Plugin Performance Profiler) Plugin to run some tests. I’m not saying these are the definitive tests, but it’s a good place to start. When P3 runs, it clears you cache so you get a worse case scenario. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as it can happen. With cache, it should only get better from here.
The P3 profiler showed a couple of things.
Surprise Culprit
When there is no cache, the Download Manager plugin kills my performance. I’m going to look for an alternative, or possibly remove all together. It’s not something I’ve been using a lot of recently anyways.
This is one of the reasons why I wanted to run an actual test, and not just assume something. You never know what hidden gotchas are out there, especially with recent updates to WordPress.
Jetpack Performance
Second, Jetpack is harming my performance. Especially with the cached. Now the P3 documentation says to not worry about Jetpack, and some other plugins, because they do more if you are logged in, which you have to be run this test.
However, while for a normal site, Jetpack isn’t going to hurt you, for Learn Dash, and some other plugins, the user will be logged in, and thus it may be hurting them. We’ll look at that in the ideas section in a minute.
Learn Dash Performance
While Learn Dash isn’t killing me over all, and not as much as I expected, it is causing each page to load about a half a second longer on average.
While this isn’t horrible, it’s not great either. On my site, I have two sets of users I’m targeting. One is some general knowledge, the second is in the creation of some classes. I don’t want to harm one my non-course content.
Ideas/Solutions
So this is the idea which I’ve come up with.
First, I’m going to disable my Download Manager. I’m thinking it might have some incompatibilities with WordPress 5.x. Whether I use a different one, or none at all, I’ve not decided yet.
Second, I plan to move my Learn Dash content to a separate WordPress instance on a sub-domain.
This means that I will have something like train.access2learn.com for my Learn Dash content. Then I will have my regular access2learn.com for my non-course content.
This means two WordPress installs, two sets of admins I need to manage.
On the other hand, I can customize the plugins. So Learn Dash won’t be on my main site, and Jetpack won’t be on my training site with Learn Dash. This should make both sides faster/easier.
It will also allow me to hide content from search engines easier, and turn off comments on some sections where I don’t need it.
I’ll be putting together a project plan this week, and trying to execute it. I’ll follow up with results as soon as they are done.
Effects of Plugins on WordPress Websites was originally found on Access 2 Learn
