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What are HTTP Requests?
HTTP requests occur when a web browser sends a request to the server for your website pages. Your server will heed this request when a user visits a page on your website and return the files contained on that page to the browser of the user. The fewer HTTP requests a website will make, the faster the website can load. Every time anyone visits a page on your website a request is sent to your web server by the person’s web browser (popular browsers like Chrome, Firefox, and Safari). On your site, your server hosts the website they are trying to access.
The browser (popular browsers like Chrome, Firefox, and Safari) required certain files from your server for your website to display properly. This file may include text, photos, or multimedia on your webpage. Once that file is received by the person’s browser, it starts rendering your website on the person’s computer screen or mobile device. If there is more content on your webpage the browser has not yet received, the browser will send another HTTP request. The above steps define a single HTTP request, from request to respond. HTTP stands for “Hypertext Transfer Protocol,” a name for a web browser that sends a file request, and a server that sends (or “transfers”) that file to a browser.
Why HTTP requests affect the user experience
There are two reasons why HTTP requests can affect the user experience of your website: the number of files that are requested and the size of the files that are being transferred.
More Files= More HTTP Requests. For every single file on your website, a web browser needs to make a separate HTTP request. If there are not many files on your website, it won’t take too long to request and access those files and display them on your site. But most decent websites do have many files. The more files on your website, the more HTTP requests your user’s browser will need to make. The more HTTP requests a browser makes, the longer your site takes to load.
Bigger Files= Longer HTTP requests. The size of the transferred file is also a factor in the time a page may take to load on a user’s computer. And just as your computer’s files have different file sizes— measured in bytes (B), kilobytes (KB), megabytes (MB), and so forth— so do the files stored on your website. Large, high-definition images files are mostly been responsible for the large file sizes.
In other words, the website that has the greater or higher definition of the content, the bigger the file size is. The greater the size of the file, the longer it takes to transfer it to a user’s browser from your server. The longer this file is transit, the longer a user’s browser has to wait before it on his / her screen returns this content.
Why HTTP requests impact the user experience
A long load time to load your website for your users can be a disruptive and frustrating experience. Mobile users will have a particularly bad experience too, as most of them will have to wait until every content on a webpage is downloaded in their mobile browser.
And research shows that when it comes to the performance of the website, load time matters. The bounce rate of a page can rise from 9 percent to a whopping 38 percent of its page load time increases from just 2 seconds to 5 seconds, according to data from Pingdom, a web site performance monitor. This is because during that three-second delay, lots more people “bounce” out of your website.
So, what’s the magic number of HTTP requests should a website aim for?
The answer is not “one.” Some people think the problem can be solved by using only one JavaScript file to control their entire website. But remember: The file size also affects load time. That one file may also take long time to serve it from your server to the browser of your audience. Although there isn’t necessarily an optimal number of files your webpage should be reduced to, You can aim it for between 10–30 files.
It is difficult to get there for most top-performing websites, and generally requires dedicated skilled web developer resources. As of Jan 2020, there were between 69 and 75 requests for the median number of HTTP page requests to load a webpage on mobile or desktop.
How to Reduce HTTP Requests on Your Website
The metrics behind this is to be responsible for this can heavily depend on how a website’s backend is developed. For example, your webpage can slow down the load time of the page by a high number of HTTP requests which ultimately damages the user experience. This can trigger your visitors to leave the page faster if it isn’t loading quickly enough which ultimately increases the bounce rate for that website. HTTP requests can affect many key metrics that determine how your audience is engaged with your business.
How to make your Website with fewer HTTP requests
Following are the few steps you can take to reduce Http request,
1. Grade the performance of your web site to find the root problem.
2. Check how many HTTP requests your site currently makes.
3. Remove unnecessary images.
4. Reduce the file size for the remaining images.
5. Set your website to load JavaScript files asynchronously.
6. Evaluate other parts of your page that are contributing to page load time.
7. Combine CSS files.
