How do I optimize WordPress page load time? (Speed up my site!)

From a WPUniversity reader:

Optimizing page load time is a real pain! How do I speed up my site?

We definitely feel your pain.

There are a few solutions to that issue.

1. Get setup with a CDN like Cloudflare (it’s free if you don’t need an SSL certificate) or MAX CDN
2. Get the W3 Total Cache plugin
   1. Enable Page Caching
   2. Try minification of CSS and JS files
   3. Lastly you can also have W3 work with other CDN options which is strongly encouraged.
3. Make sure your site has been properly and professionally coded.
4. Check that your host provides you with at least 128mb of RAM. You can attempt to force WordPress to increase your ram usage by editing your wp-config file.

If you’re comfortable, you can try this: http://codex.wordpress.org/Editing_wp-config.php#Increasing_memory_allocated_to_PHP

If you have any follow-up questions, please put them into the comment section below.

** Update

Lastly, check out this presentation by Jon Brown… he put together one of the most comprehensive slide decks on performance improvements.