Computer and electronics retailer Dell Inc. topped the list of speediest e-commerce desktop sites among the top 100 online retailers according to digital performance analytics company Catchpoint Systems Inc.
Catchpoint’s data shows that Dell’s desktop site loaded in an average of 1.15 seconds between August 14-28. Dell is No. 3 in the Internet Retailer 2016 Top 500 Guide. That speed was 2.05 seconds faster than the average load speed during the same period for the 100 e-retailers included in Catchpoint’s desktop performance index.
Contacts retailer 1-800 Contacts Inc. (No. 84 in the Top 500) was close behind, ranking No. 2 on the desktop performance index and loading in 1.15 seconds, and Apple Inc. (No. 2 in the Top 500) ranked third, loading in 1.19 seconds.
Three of the fastest-loading desktop sites were also among the top ten fastest loading mobile sites in Catchpoint System’s most recent monthly mobile performance index, which IR reported in mid-August. Those retailers are Apple, which was No. 3 on the Catchpoint desktop index and No. 4 on the mobile index; Shop.com (No. 59 in the Top 500), which was No. 5 on desktop and No. 3 on mobile; and Sweetwater.com (No. 89 in the Top 500), which was No. 8 on desktop and No. 7 on mobile.
While there is not a perfect correlation between page weights and web load times, all of the top 10 desktop sites had lighter home pages than the top 100 index average. The top 10 performing retailers had an average desktop home page weight of 1.42 megabytes compared to total index average of 2.65 megabytes.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (No. 4 in the Top 500) and Williams-Sonoma Inc. (No. 21) are exceptions to this rule. Wal-Mart’s desktop site is relatively light at 1.90 megabytes, yet it was at the bottom of the desktop performance index, loading in 5.48 seconds. Williams-Sonoma had a desktop home page weight of 5.24 megabytes and it loaded in 3.29 seconds, just below the index average of 3.20 seconds.
Catchpoint Systems monitors each website’s home page with measurements taken from Catchpoint Systems’ in-country or in-region monitoring nodes, at intervals of five minutes for two weeks each month. Backbone monitoring nodes are the locations of Catchpoint’s devices that are near data centers operated by the main Internet Service Providers that provide service to a city. The nodes simulate end-user contact with each website. Catchpoint monitors webpage load time, availability, hosts and items. They are defined as follows:
Webpage load time: The time it takes for enough page elements to load for a consumer to begin interacting with a page, such as searching, tapping or scrolling. From a consumer point of view, the time it takes for the progress bar or spinning wheel to stop.
Availability: The percentage of time during the test week that the site can be successfully reached by a consumer.Host: Any domain that delivers data, content or services over the Internet to the site.
Items or Requests: Webpage components, such as files or images that a page loads from internal and external hosts or domains. These can include PDFs, PNGs, JPEGs and GIFs.
The top 10 retailers are ranked based on their desktop webpage load times.
For the two weeks Aug. 14-28, the average desktop web page load time among the top 100 retailers was 3.20 seconds. The average total downloaded on to the desktop site home page was 2.65 megabytes, and the websites were 99.82% available. The average number of hosts was 51.67. And the average total number of times on the home page was 172.19.
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