Google has used Core Web Vitals as a ranking signal since 2021, and in March 2024 Interaction to Next Paint (INP) replaced First Input Delay.
What Core Web Vitals measure
LCP (loading, good ≤ 2.5 s), INP (responsiveness, good ≤ 200 ms) and CLS (visual stability, good ≤ 0.1), assessed on real-user data at the 75th percentile.
Six fixes we apply before every launch
- Serve the hero image in AVIF or WebP with fetchpriority=”high”.
- Never lazy-load images visible on first load.
- Set width and height on every image, video and embed.
- Self-host and subset fonts.
- Delay non-essential third-party scripts.
- Pre-render pages and cache them at the edge.
What it means for rankings
Page experience is one signal among many — but it always affects how many visitors stay long enough to become customers.