PrestaShop is a powerful e-commerce platform that allows you to create and manage your online store with ease. However, sometimes you may notice that your website is slow or laggy, which can affect your user experience, conversion rate, and SEO ranking. That’s why it is important to optimize your PrestaShop performance and make your website faster and smoother.

In this article, we will show you some of the best ways to optimize your PrestaShop performance and improve your website speed. We will cover the following topics:

• Updating PHP version
• Enabling compression, caching, and minification
• Configuring Smarty settings
• Choosing a dedicated hosting
• Removing unused images and files
• Optimizing database and queries
• Disabling unnecessary modules and features
• Using a CDN

Updating PHP Version

One of the first things you should do to optimize your PrestaShop performance is to update your PHP version to the latest one available. PHP is the programming language that runs your website, and newer versions are usually faster, more secure, and more compatible with PrestaShop.

According to the PrestaShop documentation, the recommended PHP version for PrestaShop 1.7 is PHP 7.3 or higher. You can check your current PHP version in your PrestaShop back office by going to Advanced Parameters > Information.

To update your PHP version, you need to contact your hosting provider or use a control panel like cPanel or Plesk. Make sure to backup your website before updating PHP, as some changes may cause errors or compatibility issues.

Enabling Compression, Caching, and Minification

Another way to optimize your PrestaShop performance is to enable compression, caching, and minification settings in your PrestaShop back office. These settings will reduce the size of your website files and speed up their delivery to the browser.

To access these settings, go to Advanced Parameters > Performance and look for the following options:

• Combine, Compress and Cache: Set these options to Yes for CSS files, JavaScript files, and HTML files. This will combine multiple files into one, compress them using gzip or deflate algorithms, and cache them on the server or browser.
• Media servers: If you have multiple domains or subdomains for your website, you can use them as media servers to serve static files like images, CSS, or JavaScript. This will reduce the load on your main server and improve parallel downloads.
• CCC (Combine, Compress and Cache) settings: You can also enable some additional CCC settings for CSS files and JavaScript files, such as moving JavaScript to the end of the HTML document or using inline JavaScript in HTML.

Configuring Smarty Settings

Smarty is the template engine that PrestaShop uses to render pages for your website. You can optimize its settings to improve your PrestaShop performance and reduce server load.

To configure Smarty settings, go to Advanced Parameters > Performance and look for the following options:

• Template compilation: Set this option to Never recompile template files if you are not making any changes to your theme or templates. This will prevent Smarty from checking and recompiling template files on every page load.
• Cache: Set this option to Yes if you want Smarty to cache template files on the server. This will reduce the number of database queries and improve page loading time.
• Multi-front optimizations: Set this option to No if you have only one front server or if your Smarty cache is shared across your front servers on the same file system. This will prevent Smarty from synchronizing cache files between servers.
• Cache type: Set this option to File System if you want Smarty to store cache files on the local file system. This is faster than using MySQL as a cache type.
• Clear cache every time something has been modified: Set this option to Yes if you want Smarty to clear cache files every time you make a change in your back office. This will ensure that your visitors see the latest version of your website.

Choosing a Dedicated Hosting

The hosting provider that you choose for your website can have a significant impact on your PrestaShop performance. If you are using a shared hosting plan, you may experience slow loading times or downtime due to other websites on the same server competing for resources.

The best option for optimizing your PrestaShop performance is to choose a dedicated hosting plan that gives you full control over your server resources and configuration. A dedicated hosting plan will also provide better security, reliability, and scalability for your website.

There are many hosting providers that offer dedicated hosting plans for PrestaShop websites. Some of them are:

• : A2 Hosting offers fast and reliable dedicated hosting plans with SSD storage, turbo servers, free SSL certificates, cPanel control panel, and 24/7 support.
• : SiteGround offers managed dedicated hosting plans with SSD storage, custom server setup, free SSL certificates, cPanel control panel, and 24/7 support.
• : HostArmada offers fast and reliable dedicated hosting plans with SSD storage, turbo servers, free SSL certificates, cPanel control panel, and 24/7 support.

Here are the top 5 dedicated hosting services that we recommend for PrestaShop websites. Tutosquad Top 5.

When choosing a dedicated hosting plan, make sure to check the server specifications, such as CPU, RAM, disk space, bandwidth, and operating system. You should also consider the location of the server and its proximity to your target audience.

Removing Unused Images and Files

Another way to optimize your PrestaShop performance is to remove unused images and files from your server. These files can take up valuable disk space and slow down your website loading time.

To find and remove unused images and files, you can use a tool like Store Manager for PrestaShop. This tool allows you to run a store diagnostics and identify the images that exist on the server but are not linked to any product or category. You can then delete them in bulk with a few clicks.

You can also use Store Manager for PrestaShop to optimize your product images and reduce their file size without losing quality. This will improve your website speed and SEO ranking.

Optimizing Database and Queries

Your PrestaShop database is where all your website data is stored, such as products, orders, customers, settings, etc. Over time, your database may become bloated with unnecessary or outdated data that can affect your PrestaShop performance and security.

To optimize your PrestaShop database and queries, you can use a tool like phpMyAdmin or Adminer. These tools allow you to access and manage your database from a web browser. You can use them to perform the following tasks:

• Backup your database: Before making any changes to your database, you should always backup your data in case something goes wrong. You can use phpMyAdmin or Adminer to export your database as a SQL file and save it on your computer or cloud storage.
• Repair and optimize tables: Sometimes, your database tables may become corrupted or fragmented due to errors or deletions. You can use phpMyAdmin or Adminer to repair and optimize your tables and reclaim disk space and improve performance.
• Delete unused tables: If you have installed or uninstalled any modules or themes on your website, they may have created or left behind some tables in your database that are no longer needed. You can use phpMyAdmin or Adminer to delete these tables and free up some space.
• Delete old data: If you have a lot of old data in your database, such as orders, carts, logs, messages, etc., you can use phpMyAdmin or Adminer to delete them and reduce the size of your database. However, be careful not to delete any data that you may need for legal or accounting purposes.
• Index columns: Indexing is a process that creates a reference for the columns in your database tables that are frequently used in queries. This helps speed up the queries and improve performance. You can use phpMyAdmin or Adminer to index the columns that are used for searching, filtering, sorting, or joining.

Disabling Unnecessary Modules and Features

PrestaShop comes with many modules and features that can enhance the functionality and appearance of your website. However, some of these modules and features may not be necessary for your website or may conflict with other modules or themes. This can affect your PrestaShop performance and security.

To optimize your PrestaShop performance, you should disable or uninstall any modules and features that you are not using or need on your website. You can do this by going to Modules > Module Manager in your PrestaShop back office and looking for the following options:

• Disable module: This option will deactivate the module but keep its files and settings on your server. You can reactivate it later if you need it.
• Uninstall module: This option will remove the module files and settings from your server. You will need to reinstall it if you want to use it again.
• Reset module: This option will restore the module settings to their default values. You can use this option if you want to start over with a module configuration.

You should also check the Optional Features section in Advanced Parameters > Performance and disable any features that you don’t need on your website. For example, you can disable customer groups, combinations, features, suppliers, brands, etc.

Using a CDN

A CDN (Content Delivery Network) is a network of servers that are distributed around the world and deliver static content (such as images, CSS, JavaScript) from the closest server to the user’s location. This reduces the distance between the user and the server and improves the website speed and performance.

Using a CDN can also help you reduce the load on your main server, save bandwidth costs, increase security, and improve SEO ranking.

There are many CDN providers that offer services for PrestaShop websites. Some of them are:

• Cloudflare: Cloudflare is a popular CDN provider that offers free and paid plans with various features such as caching, compression, minification, SSL, firewall, DDoS protection, and more.
• KeyCDN: KeyCDN is a fast and reliable CDN provider that offers pay-as-you-go plans with features such as caching, compression, minification, SSL, HTTP/2, and more.
• StackPath: StackPath is a secure CDN provider that offers flat-rate plans with features such as caching, compression, minification, SSL, firewall, DDoS protection, and more.

To use a CDN for your PrestaShop website, you need to sign up for a CDN provider and follow their instructions to configure your website settings. You may also need to install a module or plugin to integrate your CDN with your PrestaShop website.

Optimizing your PrestaShop performance is not a one-time task, but an ongoing process that requires regular monitoring and maintenance. By following the tips and methods in this article, you can improve your website speed and performance and provide a better user experience for your visitors and customers.

We hope you found this article helpful and informative. If you have any questions or feedback, please feel free to leave a comment below. Thank you for reading!