10 Best WordPress Caching Plugins

This article was updated on August 6th, 2020 at 05:57 am

With same day delivery services, TV shows streaming online within seconds, instant cabs, tables at restaurants or even booking a date with a smartphone app, we are a generation that has gotten used to instant gratification. The “I want it now” generation, who is addicted to the faster ways of doing things, isn’t ready to wait for anything.

We are becoming so impatient that a slow internet connection can drive us nuts. In fact, when a webpage take a couple of extra seconds to load, it can feel like an eternity. This is why 57% of visitors are unlikely to wait for more than 3 seconds for a webpage to load and will abandon it all together, while 75% of online visitors will choose a competitor’s site, rather than suffer inordinate delays. This is what the statistics published by Aykira had to say. Delay of even a single second in the loading of a website can result in a 7% reduction in conversions.

Well, these statistics are enough to tell you that when it comes to the success of a webpage, every second counts, WordPress sites being no exception. It is for this reason that no matter where you turn, the world is talking about load times and optimizing their sites to load as quickly as possible. They are trying out different ways to improve load times, of which the most effective for WordPress are plugins.

Importance of Caching Plugins

The need to optimize WordPress sites is well understood, given that a faster loading website is considered superior in terms of user experience. It is highly beneficial from an SEO perspective, search engine rankings and can decide a business’ sales conversions. This is where caching plugins come to the rescue of a large number of bloggers and businesses.

In caching, the static version of the content is created and served to visitors. The static pages are rendered quickly in browsers, which gives visitors a high performing site.

10 Amazing WordPress Caching Plugins

Let us try to understand this. In order to render or fetch a page in WordPress, queries are sent back and forth from the database. Caching plugins create static HTML files from your dynamic WordPress page. Creating a static copy of the page takes away the need to sending multiple queries back and forth from the database. As a result, the load on the server is significantly reduced and the WordPress site loads within a second or two.

1. WP Rocket:

If you are desperately trying to look for ways to increase site speed, WP Rocket is one plugin you can’t overlook. The plugin was created by a French company. Amidst all the other free caching plugins available today, WP Rocket was the first plugin to have been released as a premium plugin.

2. WP Fastest Cache:

One of the most popular, recommended and easy to setup Leverage Browser Caching WordPress Plugins, WP Fastest Cache, has more than 300,000 active installations and has received five star ratings.

3. W3 Super Cache:

W3 Super Cache can be the ultimate choice if your goal is improving SEO and user experience of your WordPress site by reducing the load times and increasing website performance. The plugin also reduces download times via features like content delivery network (CDN) integration.

4. W3 Total Cache:

The best caching plugin that allows for page cache, database cache, browser cache and CDN integration, W3 Total Cache was once a very popular choice. It has over 1 million active installs. However, soon other caching plugins started to steal the limelight.

5. Comet Cache:

Today, with the delay of even a single second putting visitors off, superfast yet simple and reliable caching plugins like Comet Cache have become indispensable. The plugin works by taking a real-time snapshot of every post, page, link and category, and storing them intuitively for later reference. This saves a lot of time, which would otherwise be wasted in processing. These snapshots are then stored (cached) intuitively, so that they can be referenced later, in order to save all of that time was being wasted on processing each time a request was made.

6. Cache Enabler:

A plugin that complies with the latest web protocol standards and supports WebP image formats, Cache Enabler is a lightweight WP caching plugin that speeds up a site by generating static HTML files. The plugin was created by the company behind KeyCDN, a Content Delivery Network service. What’s more, Cache Enable is also one of the first caching plugins that makes use of WebP support.

7. Hyper Cache:

Hyper Cache is designed to obtain maximum speed for your WordPress site. This versatile and purely PHP caching plugin can be used for high-end servers as well as low resource hosting, making this plugin an instant choice of everyone.

8. Cachify:

Working similar to most other caching plugins, Cachify also optimizes WordPress page load by caching pages, posts and custom post types as static content. The page or post can directly be pulled from the cache, whenever a load request is made.

9. Simple Cache:

It should come as no surprise that being the best at something comes at a cost. This is like wanting a WordPress site that receives high traffic or thousands of visitors every day, but all these visitors affect load time. And you know how delay of even a single second can make you lose visitors and revenue. This is where Simple Cache comes in. It is easy to install and even easier to delete. It is a WordPress plugin designed to take care of those high traffic times, ensuring your site runs at top speed.

10. WPCache:

I have saved one of the easiest and fastest WordPress caching plugins for the last. There is evidence that all caching plugins can clash with other plugins or themes on WordPress. This is not the case with WPCache, which has received a five star rating and is indeed one of the best caching plugins known till date.

The above mentioned 10 caching plugins are great. However, I would advise you to dig deeper and go through their reviews to find the best one for your specific website.