Blog

The BoltAudit blog

Field notes on WordPress performance, AI-driven bottleneck detection, and the slow-site mistakes we keep finding.

performance
Jun 29, 2026 6 min read

WordPress TTFB: What Good Looks Like and How to Fix It

WordPress TTFB is the foundation every other speed metric sits on. Here is what it measures, what good looks like in 2026, and the four-step walk that drops it from 1.2s to under 200ms.

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performance
Jun 29, 2026 6 min read

Why Your WooCommerce Checkout Is Slow (and the Fix)

A slow WooCommerce checkout costs a sale on every visit, not just a bounce. Here is why checkout is slow in a way no other page is, and the four-layer fix path in priority order.

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performance
Jun 28, 2026 5 min read

WordPress Autoload Optimization: Fix wp_options Bloat

WordPress autoload optimization is the cheapest TTFB win on most sites. Here are the diagnostic queries, the three-bucket fix, and how to keep wp_options under 1MB in the long term.

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performance
Jun 23, 2026 6 min read

WordPress Mobile Performance: Fix Slow LCP and CLS

WordPress on mobile is far slower than your tooling shows. Here is why the gap exists and the five high-leverage fixes that close it, focused on real-world Core Web Vitals.

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performance
Jun 23, 2026 6 min read

How to Read the WordPress Slow Query Log

The WordPress slow query log shows which database queries are dragging your site down. Here is how to enable it, read it in the right order, and fix the queries that actually matter.

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performance
Jun 23, 2026 4 min read

Autoload Bloat: The Silent WordPress Performance Killer

Autoload bloat is when wp_options loads megabytes of data on every uncached request. Here is what it is, how to spot it with one query, and how to safely shrink it.

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performance
Jun 22, 2026 6 min read

The Four Layers of WordPress Performance: A Field Guide

A plain-English field guide to the four layers of WordPress performance: frontend, backend, database, and infrastructure; the symptoms each one causes; and how to find the real bottleneck before you fix anything.

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Release Note
Jun 18, 2026 2 min read

What's new in BoltAudit 0.4.0: one-click cleanup for orphaned post metadata

BoltAudit 0.4.0 adds a one-click fix for orphaned post metadata, clearing leftover database rows from deleted posts without touching any live content.

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performance
Jun 18, 2026 5 min read

WordPress database cleanup for beginners: what to delete and what to leave alone

Your WordPress database fills up with junk over time — old drafts, leftover data, failed background jobs. Here's a beginner-friendly guide to cleaning it safely.

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performace
Jun 14, 2026 10 min read

Lighthouse vs Query Monitor vs BoltAudit: which tool tells you why your WordPress site is slow

Lighthouse shows the symptom. Query Monitor shows one request. BoltAudit ranks every fix by speed-up. Here's which tool to use, when, and why most sites need two.

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wordpress
Jun 13, 2026 9 min read

How to find which plugin is slowing down your WordPress site?

Disabling plugins one by one is slow and risky. Here's how to find the exact Plugin slowing down your WordPress site in under 10 minutes, on a live site, safely.

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performance
Apr 22, 2026 4 min read

Why Your WordPress Site Is Slow: Find the Real Bottleneck

A plain-English guide to why your WordPress site is slow, the four layers a bottleneck hides in, and how to find the real cause in under two minutes.

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