How to Add a Cache Using Cache WordPress Plugins and Set Them Up

Cache WordPress Plugins

In this article we will guide you through the best cache WordPress plugins and the ways to set them up easily in order to fasten up your WordPress powered website and use caching as one of the greatest functional improvements to have on your website.

One of the best things you can do for your WordPress authored website is to take care of its functional qualities and performing rate. On the whole, caching your website and making it work better and faster is one of the best optimizing ways that does not require extra endeavors.

If we try to delve into the meat of caching, we will discover that it is the process responsible for storing of the static version of what is generated in WordPress.

The principle is as follows. Caching creates the static versions or copies of your posts and pages, etc and served them to your visitors from the cache (also known as RAM or server’s hard disk or memory) whenever a request is made.

And with those actively generated things, caching functionality dynamically boosts your WP website and prepares it to handle massively large amount of web traffic.

If we exert ourselves to recall all the benefits of using caching mechanisms, we’ll hardy be able to do it at once. The true beauty of exercising this method is that it comes with boundless benefits and advantages for your website or blog.

First of all, it enhances the speed and operation of your site since static cache files load faster than the dynamic ones. Apart from that, caching your web content is a productive way to contribute to the performance also of your hosting server.

It is needless to mention that speedy and fast performing website get higher rankings on search engines and their inquiries. Additionally, the speed at which your digital profile responds to request is critically important for the web visitor’s experience, client retention and for a number of other reasons.

All in all, the functionality of caching brought to your website is a never ending chain of benefits you can totally enjoy.

With this motivational picture of caching your website, let’s now pass on to the question of how to add a cache using cache plugins and set them up.

Basically, plugins are the best and the most user friendly tools which come to our mind when it comes to adding caching controls to the WordPress website. WordPress content management system grants you with a rich library of WordPress cache plugins for you to review and find the best mix and match for your site.

In this relation, we have sorted out some of those plugins which have been tested by hundreds of users and as such are worth relying on.

1. WP Fastest Cache:

It is one of the actively discussed and frequently used ways to add a cache to your site while using cache plugins. User and developer optimized, easy to follow and understand, WP Fastest Cache takes the whole responsibility of storing your HTML files in a static format while using php and mysql when the page is rendered.

It completely removes the complexity of adding the much needed caching controls to your site and activating it.

Simply upload wp-fastest-cache to wp-content/plugins directory, go to the admin dashboard of your site and activate this plugin through Plugins menu, take care that permission of .htaccess file is 64 and enable the plugin from the option page.

As for the most practical features, this plugin provides you with, they are many, including the Mod_Rewrite method, deletion of all cache files after the publication of a post or page, cache timeout for certain pages.

You can also delete cached files or minified css and js files from the option page, enable or disable cache functionality for mobiles or logged in web users, etc.

2. W3 Total Cache:

W3 Total Cache is also one of the best cache plugins to add a cache to your WordPress based website and optimize its performance and speed in all the possible ways.

Make your site’s operation fast and lightweight with this plugin which have been installed millions of times. Is custom built and well developed to meet the needs of your website when it comes to quick loading and response rate.

While proceeding with the installation and activation of W3 Total Cache plugin, we insist on deactivating and removing all the other cache plugins you might have chosen to use to fasten up your site. If you don’t take care of it, you may be faced with unpleasant issues in the nearest future.

Then land on your WP admin panel, Plugins, Add New, search and find W3 Total Cache, install and activate it. Since this plugin is feature rich and comes with tons of control, you might need a certain time to go through each of them and configure them accordingly.

First, you need to go to General Settings and enable page caching from here, as well as choose page cache method. We recommend you to use Disk: Enhanced method for better results.

The next step of the work is with Browser cache. For this you need to visit Performance, Browser Cache and add your configurations here. At this point, you can set Last-Modified header, expires header, cache control header, enable HTTP compression, disable cookies for static files and more.

And finally, if you website is using CDN provider, you need to turn to Content Delivery Network tab and determine your preferences here.

3. WP Super Cache:

Meet the next amazingly effective and highly optimized tool among WordPress cache plugins at your disposal.

Guaranteed to go hand in hand with any WordPress generated profile, site or blog, this product is also proficient in generating static HTML files and such making your site’s performance more enjoyable and quick.

The installation and activation process is just the same as in the case of the previous plugin via finding and activating it through your WP admin dashboard.

Research shows that around 47% expect that the page of any website should load in about 2 seconds and if it takes longer then they abandon the page.

This 2-3 second window decides whether the traffic which has been directed towards the website after so many efforts actually gets converted or not. Now the first thing which comes to mind for quick upload is the reduction in the file size.

A simple comparison shows that the minimum download which the visitors make today is about 2.2 MB which is due to the inclusion of videos, images, fonts etc. This was just 702 KB in 2010. The whole equation has changed and thus the role of the cache WordPress plugins becomes important.

If you are not sure what caching is here is a simple explanation, when one visits your page the information is requested from the host page.

This includes PHP files, scripts, HTML, images, fonts etc. There is also the data like posts and pages which are accessed by the visitors. Now the process requires access to this data each time a request is made which means there is a huge wait period.

Now, unless an update has been made it is unlikely that any changes in the post would be made. This is where the work of the cache WordPress plugins comes into play.

It creates a static version of the page on the devices so that the amount of download is reduced and the visitors do not have to wait longer. Since the transmission between the browser, database, and the web server is reduced the loading time is decreased.

Now the simple worry would be that what happens when new content is added. Does that mean that the visitors will not be able to access that due to the already downloaded versions of data? No, the cache plugins are designed in such a way that they empty the cache and then regenerate it with new content when there is a special need.

This works as the plugins do not do not touch anything which is static but only works on something which has been changed on the page making the process fast and keeping all the required information intact.

Is it needed?

There is no doubt that cache plugin is a good decision for your website. Think about this without it the visitors on the website will download the web pages each time they visit your page. But the modern browsers and with the use of cache, the visitors who return to the page do not have to download everything again.

The user takes the whole process ahead and takes away the need for many intermediate steps. Along with the main cache, there are many supporting server-side caching available which include object caching, page caching etc.

Choosing the cache plugin is not a difficult task once you have taken the decision of installing one. WordPress has easy installation and support feature so that there is no difficulty even at any later stage.