Learn about Accelerated Mobile Pages and why your website needs it right now!
- Semil Shah
- October 12, 2021
Table of Contents
What is an Accelerated Mobile Page?
It is true that consumers and businesses alike are moving toward a mobile-first mindset.
We would be understating the case if we said that users consult their mobile phones before making purchases. The percentage of mobile internet users has surpassed that of desktops worldwide.
AMP was quite a big deal when it was first released. Google insisted it was here to stay, as did many large sites like Twitter.
AMP has, however, received less attention in recent years. Google quietly took away the AMP icon in 2021.
Where does AMP fit in? Is it relevant today? Is it relevant at all?
You will learn everything about AMP (accelerated mobile pages), including what it is, what it does, how it works, the pros and cons, and whether it is worth your time and energy to implement in 2021.
If you look around on the internet you will find the following meaning of Accelerated Mobile Page, “ AMP is an open-source HTML framework developed by the AMP Open Source Project. It was originally created by Google as a competitor to Facebook Instant Articles and Apple News. AMP is optimized for mobile web browsing and intended to help web pages load faster.”
To simply put it, pages are optimized to open fast on mobile devices. This is also a ranking factor on Google. The faster a page loads the higher it ranks on Google.
Bounce Rate Impacted by Page Speed
Mobile web page bounce rate is affected by speed. It is important to point out that for mobile site bounce rates, speed is primarily considered in two perspectives, namely, page load time and DOM readiness:
- DOM ready time: The DOM ready time measures the time it takes for the browser to parse the HTML code of a page. The DOM ready time is the best predictor of bounce rate.
It is necessary to read and parse HTML code before any page elements, such as images, can be loaded, even if the user is unaware of it.
Slow-loading websites are caused by taking too long to process HTML codes. To speed up the DOM-ready time of your mobile web page, avoid putting JavaScript on your page because it blocks the browser’s ability to parse the HTML.
JavaScript is used to load third-party ads and social widgets from external servers.
- Full-page load time: An image, font, CSS code, and so on, take time to load on a website. The bounce rate goes down when a full page loads quickly.
Optimizing images, fonts, and avoiding third-party files that could slow the loading time of your webpage is the best way to ensure a faster full-page loading time.
The average user is likely to abandon a page if it loads slowly. What’s worse, 79% of users won’t return once they’ve experienced a slow experience.
Take a look at these startling facts regarding page loading time:
- Over a 3G connection, a mobile site usually loads in 19 seconds, and 77% take over 10 seconds to load.
- The extra time it takes for a web page to load lowers conversions by 20%. Compared to 19-second sites, sites with a 5-second load time generated 2x more mobile ad revenue.
- More than half of users who had difficulty accessing a mobile site are unlikely to visit the site again.
Why is this important?
In the event the mobile page does not load immediately, it won’t be fast enough for users. They’ll bounce and probably won’t return.
Your mobile website and post-click landing pages must be AMPlified so that this does not happen.
The Pros and Cons of AMP?
In February 2016, AMP became visible in search results for the first time. The internet marketing experts said it was the future. Over the years, however, the shine has worn off.
It appears that users are losing trust in AMP since Google no longer displays the AMP badge in search results.
Additionally, Kinsta’s case study found AMP reduced sales leads by a whopping 59 percent.
With AMP, content loaded much faster on mobile devices simply by doing away with more complex coding. Mobile devices make up over half of all internet traffic, so this is vital.
As well as the advantages, there are also a few disadvantages. Here are the upsides and downsides of AMP.
Accelerated Mobile Pages Pros
Users can view AMP-style content that is stripped down, which has several advantages. These include:
- By eliminating non-essential elements, AMP can speed up the loading time of websites. Increasing numbers of people have access to the internet via their mobile devices, which is crucial.
- Faster page loading times are more important in search rankings than AMP. As a result, your website might rank higher on Google.
- The process of implementing AMP on WordPress is simple and quick, at least for WordPress sites. AMP results in faster load times and higher search rankings. Site owners were attracted to a plug-in to get more visitors.
Accelerated Mobile Pages Cons
AMP does not appeal to everyone. It has received some backlash. So, what are the cons of AMP? Read on to find out.
- WordPress is mandatory: You need coding expertise and help from your developer to create an AMP page if you don’t have WordPress. If you don’t have WordPress, you’ll need to create one from scratch.
- AMP pages are less monetized: AMP pages display fewer advertisements, which is good for speed but not so good if you rely on advertisements for your income.
- Analytics limitations: The AMP page actually sits on Google’s servers, so standard analytics tags cannot be added to it. Changes are difficult to observe, so you can’t tell how they affect traffic and impact your website.
- Content and design customization are impacted:AMP strips out a lot of “unnecessary” elements, but those elements can be used to boost traffic or promote branding.
- Lead generation is restricted: Furthermore, AMP strips forms and downloadable assets, which makes it harder for sites to gather potential customers’ contact information.
- Social sharing limited: Due to the fact that most social share buttons are developed using JavaScript, they may not even display properly.
There are many cons to AMP, as you can see. While AMP’s primary function is to increase site speed, there are many other ways to do so.
Should you Use Accelerated Mobile Pages?
Google search results might favor AMP caching because it offers faster loading times, but it comes with some pitfalls.
For starters, AMP does not work unless the user clicks on the AMP version as opposed to the canonical one. Studies have shown that server requests can be cut down by as much as 77 percent if AMP is implemented correctly. But if the implementation has flaws, the server will probably not offer the AMP version of the document.
Although analytics for this is growing, tracking AMP pages through Analytics, Ads or DoubleClick is still somewhat limited, as mentioned in one of the cons.
AMP implementation involves sacrificing an important part of your website’s UX. Compressed HTML code will prioritize efficiency over creativity any day. AMP pages are also limited in their ability to contain more advertisement tags, not just rendering images. In addition, the WordPress plugin affected the ease of implementing this code.
Though the AMP project was met with great fervor on its launch, development has been sluggish, and many users haven’t even begun to realize what AMP served content on a mobile device is.
Does your website need AMP? It’s not necessary, but it does have some benefits.I believe that AMP will be a useful tool for publishers in the future of mobile search. Although there needs to be easy access to the AMp plugin for WordPress until then I suppose users are better off using dynamic pages on mobile.
Thanks to AMP’s multiple commands, you can make your SEO strategy more effective by customizing AMP documents.
How do I stop Accelerated Pages on my Phone
If your internet connection is slow, AMP might be the answer. A simplified version of the site should not be forced on users with high-speed internet. Adding to the problem, Google does not offer a way to disable the feature.
Here are some ways to deactivate AMP if you find it annoying.
1. Change the search engine you use
AMP (accelerated mobile pages) is a Google product, as the name implies. By using a different search engine, Google AMP can be removed entirely.
Some of the best substitutes to Google are Microsoft Bing and DuckDuckGo. AMP versions of sites aren’t forced on their users by these search engines. In addition to Microsoft’s search engine, you might also consider Yahoo, which is one of the oldest search engines and doesn’t include AMP websites either.
2. Switch to a new browser
At the time of writing, Google Chrome has no option to turn off AMP. So, if you want to block AMP, your best bet is to try a different browser. You have many options here but let’s discuss the most effective ones.
There is no doubt that Firefox is one of the best browsers available. There are many varieties of it, like Stable, Beta, Nightly, and Focus. You won’t have to do anything to disable AMP on these versions of Firefox. In addition, DuckDuckGo displays mobile sites that are not AMP compliant.
3. View in desktop mode
All browsers provide this option. There might be a slight difference in the name, but the results will be the same.
Only mobile websites can make use of AMP. Therefore, switching from mobile to desktop can remove AMP. If you are using Chrome, you can do so by tapping the three dots at the top right corner and selecting Desktop.
AMP is the Future
The lackluster marketing campaign Google ran for AMP and skepticism towards Google itself led to many webmasters and users being unaware of AMP for a while.
There has been a significant increase in adoption. We noted earlier in the year that 31 million domains adopted AMP. Two years ago, fewer than a million did.
The rate of adoption for AMP and other similar technologies will greatly accelerate as SEO shifts away from computer towers and towards mobile devices and screens. The existing platforms are now in charge of making this transition easier for users.
About the Author
My name’s Semil Shah, and I pride myself on being the last digital marketer that you’ll ever need. Having worked internationally across agile and disruptive teams from San Fransico to London, I can help you take what you are doing in digital to a whole next level.