First Contentful Paint

OpenCart version 2.0.3.1

I have run this test https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/

And it reports a value of 4.3s for "First Contentful Paint" which is apparently sub-optimal.

As a resolution, it suggests:

"Resources are blocking the first paint of your page. Consider delivering critical JS/CSS inline and deferring all non-critical JS/styles. Learn more."

Does anyone know if there is any remedy for this for my version? Anyone know if OC version 3 improves the page rendering/opening speed?

Kind thanks

I've been meaning to write an extension for that purpose but didn't find the time yet. It is a very common issue even on a blank Opencart install without extensions. If you want I can give you a quote to do it manually, just PM me for details. I've successfully reduced those values and others reported on Page Insights for some busy stores and it's a must have for any business.

If you are on a VPS, install mod_pagespeed for Apache. It is partly developed by Google and does all what pagespeed recommendations say.

Also, implement HTTP2. If removes the need for domain sharding, reduces multiple roundtrip connections and all resources are loaded in a single connection.