Data Studies: Original Web Performance Research
Soft 404s on Ranking Sites: 8.3% Serve Pages for Fake URLs
We requested a made-up URL on 24,948 sites that rank in Google's top 20 for US searches, and 8.3% answered with a 200 instead of a 404.Matt Suffoletto · October 19, 2026 · 6 min readTechnical SEO
Robots.txt Statistics 2026: 1 in 6 Sites Lack a Working File
17.5% of the 15,470,478 origins in the September 2026 HTTP Archive crawl, about 1 in 6, have no working robots.txt file.
Technical SEO
X-Robots-Tag Noindex: 3 in 10 Noindexed Homepages Hide It in a Header
12,177 homepages in the top 1M sites by Chrome traffic tell Google not to index them, and 30.6% of those (3,722) do it with an X-Robots-Tag HTTP header instead of a meta tag.
Technical SEO
JavaScript-Only Links 2026: 13.8% of Internal Links
13.8% of the 103,799,125 same-site links on 654,723 top-1M homepages are missing from the raw HTML and only appear after JavaScript runs.
Technical SEO
JavaScript Title Rewrites: 12.6% of Top 1M Homepages
95,312 of 756,882 top-1M homepages with a rendered title (12.6%) show a different title after JavaScript runs than in the HTML the server sends.
Technical SEO
Hreflang x-default Statistics: 32.6% of Sites Skip It
Among 5,584 ranking sites with hreflang on the homepage, 32.6% have no x-default tag.
Technical SEO
Hreflang Return Link Errors: 12.1% of Multilingual Sites
We followed 10,167 hreflang alternates on 4,596 ranking sites: 10.3% of the alternate pages don't point back to the original, and 12.1% of sites have at least one broken return link.
Technical SEO
javascript:void Links 2026: 14.3% of Top 1M Homepages
14.3% of 654,723 top-1M homepages use javascript:void links and 14.1% use click handlers in place of real URLs, both of which Google's link discovery can't follow.
Technical SEO
XML Sitemap Errors: 1 in 4 Sampled Sites List URLs Google Shouldn't Index
In a sample of 187 ranking sites, 25.1% listed at least one sitemap URL that redirects, is gone or canonicalises elsewhere, and 4.6% of the 6,004 sitemap URLs we checked shouldn't have been listed.
Technical SEO
Meta Keywords Usage 2026: 28.8% of Top 1M Sites
225,157 of 782,850 homepages in the top 1M sites by Chrome traffic (28.8%) still carry a meta keywords tag, a signal Google has ignored since 2009.
Technical SEO
SEO Plugin Market Share 2026: Yoast 29.9%, Rank Math 3.6%
Of 8,811,077 WordPress homepages crawled in 2026, Yoast's signature appears on 2,636,314 (29.9%) and Rank Math's on 320,833 (3.6%).
Technical SEO
WWW vs Non-WWW Redirects: 5.9% of Ranking Sites Serve Both
When we requested the opposite host (www or non-www) on 11,071 ranking sites, 5.9% served the page on both hosts instead of redirecting to one.
Technical SEO
302 vs 301 Redirects: 12.4% of Internal Redirects Are 302s
Of 14,350 internal redirects across 293 crawled ranking sites, 12.4% are temporary 302, 303 or 307 redirects and 86.5% are permanent 301s.
Technical SEO
Uppercase URL Duplicates: 21.7% of Ranking Sites
On 21.7% of 7,111 ranking sites, requesting an inner URL in uppercase returned a 200 at that address instead of a redirect or 404.
Technical SEO
Faceted Navigation: 13% of 100 Crawled Stores Expose Filters
13 of 100 crawled online stores (13.0%) expose crawlable filter or sort URLs, and 12.7% of their crawled HTML pages carry query parameters.
Technical SEO
Shopify Duplicate Product URLs: 45.8% of Crawled Stores Link Them
33 of 72 crawled Shopify-style stores (45.8%) link to products through /collections/.../products/ URLs instead of the canonical /products/ path.
Technical SEO
WordPress Attachment Pages: Only 5.1% of Sites List Them in Sitemaps
Of 1,270 WordPress sites with a readable sitemap, 5.1% (65) reference an attachment sitemap, and the attachment sitemaps that loaded list a median of 474 image pages.
Technical SEO
Crawl Depth Statistics: 10.5% of Pages 4+ Clicks Deep
Of 175,560 crawled HTML pages on 293 ranking sites, 10.5% are four or more clicks from the homepage.
Technical SEO
Orphan Pages: 87% of Small Sites Have Sitemap URLs Nothing Links To
On 77 small sites we could crawl completely, 87.0% had at least one sitemap URL that no internal link reaches, and 8.5% of their 16,587 sitemap URLs were orphaned.
Technical SEO
ETag and Last-Modified Usage: 63% of Top 1M Sites Send Neither
493,049 of 782,570 top-1M homepages (63.0%) send neither an ETag nor a Last-Modified header, so crawlers can't make cheap conditional requests.
Technical SEO
Mobile vs Desktop Content 2026: 10.1% of Homepages Show Less on Mobile
Comparing 630,627 top-1M homepages crawled on both desktop and mobile, 10.1% show at least 30% fewer rendered words on mobile.
Technical SEO
Lazy-Loaded LCP Images 2026: 11.4% of Homepages
On 365,558 top-1M homepages whose largest element is an image, 11.4% mark that image loading='lazy', which delays LCP.
Technical SEO
HTML Page Size Statistics: 97KB Median Across Top 1M Sites
The median top-1M homepage ships 97 KB of raw HTML, and the 90th percentile ships 603 KB, across 777,142 homepages.
Technical SEO
Search Console Verification Tags: 22.3% of Top 1M Sites
174,678 of 782,850 top-1M homepages (22.3%) carry a google-site-verification meta tag, and only 2.9% carry Bing's msvalidate.01.
Technical SEO
Internal Nofollow Usage: 61.1% of Crawled Ranking Sites
179 of 293 crawled ranking sites (61.1%) nofollow at least one internal link, and 2.9% of their 17,374,383 internal links are nofollowed.
Technical SEO
Pagination Canonical Errors: 24.6% of Sites Point Page 2 Back to Page 1
Of 138 crawled sites with paginated listings, 34 (24.6%) point at least one page 2+ canonical back to page 1, which Google advises against.
Technical SEO
Internal UTM Links: 21.8% of Crawled Ranking Sites Tag Their Own
64 of 293 crawled ranking sites (21.8%) put UTM tracking parameters on at least one of their own internal links, which splits analytics sessions and creates duplicate URLs.
Technical SEO
Canonical Tag Usage 2026: 36.1% of Inner Pages Have None
223,386 of 618,568 inner pages on top-1M sites (36.1%) have no canonical tag in the rendered HTML or HTTP headers.
Technical SEO
Robots.txt Mistakes: 21.7% Use Rules Google Ignores
21.7% of 13,358,406 working robots.txt files contain at least one directive Google doesn't support.
Technical SEO
AI Crawlers in Robots.txt: GPTBot 11.8%, Googlebot 5.3%
11.8% of 13,358,406 working robots.txt files name GPTBot and 10.9% name ClaudeBot, against 5.3% that name Googlebot.
Technical SEO
Technical SEO Audit Stats: 2 in 3 of 293 Sites Have Broken Pages
195 of 293 crawled ranking sites (66.6%) have at least one page returning a 4xx error.
On-Page SEO
Title Tag Branding 2026: 73.8% Put the Brand Last
Among 21,499 top-5 ranking title tags that use a separator, 73.8% end with the brand name and only 5.3% lead with it.
On-Page SEO
Title Tag Separators: Pipe 45.3%, Hyphen 26.8%
Of 29,299 top-5 ranking title tags, 45.3% use a pipe and 26.8% a spaced hyphen, while 20.8% use no separator at all.
On-Page SEO
Years in Title Tags: Only 4.1% of Top Results Say 2026
4.1% of 29,396 top-5 ranking title tags include 2026, and 4.8% of 177,259 titles Google displays in the top 20 do.
On-Page SEO
Numbers in Title Tags 2026: 19.3% of Top 5 Results
19.3% of 29,299 top-5 ranking title tags contain a number and 5.0% use brackets or parentheses.
On-Page SEO
Title Tag vs H1 2026: Only 11.7% of Top Pages Match
On 26,314 top-5 ranking pages with both a title tag and an H1, only 11.7% use identical wording for both.
On-Page SEO
Heading Hierarchy Errors: 44.8% of Top 1M Pages Skip a Level
Of 1,119,394 top-1M pages with two or more headings, 44.8% jump a heading level, for example from H2 straight to H4.
On-Page SEO
H2s Written as Questions: 43.1% of Top 5 Results
43.1% of 19,142 top-5 ranking pages with H2s use at least one question heading, and 16.3% of all their H2s are questions.
On-Page SEO
YMYL Author Bylines 2026: Only 53.6% of Top Pages
Across 4,633 top-5 ranking pages for health, finance, insurance, legal and supplements searches, only 53.6% show a named author or byline.
On-Page SEO
Article Schema Authors: 1 in 4 Article Pages Name No Real Person
Of 80,353 top-1M pages marked up as an Article, NewsArticle or BlogPosting, 24.9% don't name a real person as the author.
On-Page SEO
Article Date Mismatches: 19.7% Differ From Schema
Among 2,578 top-5 ranking pages with both a visible <time> date and a schema or meta date, 19.7% show a date that matches none of the declared dates.
On-Page SEO
Outbound Link Statistics 2026: 55.9% of #1 Results
55.9% of 5,067 #1-ranking pages link to at least one external site in their main content, with a median of one outbound link.
On-Page SEO
Internal Links on #1 Results: 13 Median per Page
The median #1-ranking page has 13 internal links in its parsed content, across 5,067 pages, and positions 2 to 5 sit at 14.
On-Page SEO
Image File Names on Top 1M Sites: 1 in 5 Describe Nothing
21.1% of 26.7M image requests over 5 KB on top-1M pages have file names that say nothing about the picture: 10.5% are hashes or UUIDs, 9.5% are only numbers, 0.84% are camera defaults like IMG_ or DSC_ and 0.21% are screenshot names.
On-Page SEO
Max Image Preview Large: Only 17% of Top 1M Sites
133,171 of 782,850 top-1M homepages (17.0%) set max-image-preview:large, the setting Google Discover needs for large image cards.
On-Page SEO
FAQ Schema Usage 2026: Still on 2.9% of Top 1M Pages
FAQPage markup is on 40,403 of 1,401,418 pages in the top-1M crawl (2.9%), including 22,689 homepages, even though Google limited FAQ rich results to government and health sites in 2023.
On-Page SEO
1 in 5 Local Business Homepages Hide Star Ratings in Their Code
19.9% of top-1M local business homepages with schema (3,331 of 16,721) include AggregateRating markup, the kind of self-serving rating Google says it won't show as stars, and 15.8% carry it with no Product markup on the page.
On-Page SEO
1 in 30 Top 1M Homepages Ship With No Title Tag
3.3% of top-1M homepages (25,968 of 782,850) have no title tag after the page renders, and half of them (49.5%) get enough real Chrome traffic to appear in CrUX.
On-Page SEO
Two Pages, One Keyword: 58.2% of Sites Rank Twice in Google's Top 10
Of 806 sites that reach Google's US top 10 for at least 10 of our 10,019 keywords, 58.2% have at least one keyword where two different pages from the site rank at once.
On-Page SEO
Ranking Page Swaps: Same Site at #1, Different Page 18% of the Time
Of 865 keywords where the same site held #1 in every snapshot from Oct 2025 to Sept 2026, 18.0% saw Google switch which page from that site ranked #1 at least once.
On-Page SEO
Top Result Reading Level 2026: Grade 11.8 Median
The median top-5 ranking page scores Flesch-Kincaid grade 11.8, across 24,632 readable pages with 100+ parsed words.
On-Page SEO
'Best' Search Results 2026: 25.2% Are Listicles
Of 2,004 top-5 pages ranking for 'best' searches, 25.2% are listicles, rising to 27.2% at #1.
On-Page SEO
Keyword in First 100 Words: 40.1% of #1 Results
40.1% of 6,351 #1-ranking pages include every term of the search query in their first 100 words.
On-Page SEO
Table of Contents Usage: 46.3% of Long Top Guides
Of 3,767 informational top-5 ranking pages over 1,500 words, 46.3% have a table of contents, and 47.4% of those at #1 do.
On-Page SEO
Product Descriptions in Tabs: 37.7% of Product Pages
In a phone-size render of 302 ranking product pages, 37.7% put the description or product details inside tabs or accordions.
On-Page SEO
VideoObject Schema 2026: Missing on 95.8% of Video Pages
Of 49,573 top-1M pages that embed a YouTube, Vimeo or Wistia player, 95.8% have no VideoObject markup, which limits video rich results.
On-Page SEO
Boilerplate Links: 86.1% of Store Page Links Sit in Menus
Across 548 ranking store homepages and product pages loaded on a phone, a median 86.1% of followable links sat in the header, menus, drawers or footer rather than the main content.
On-Page SEO
Category Page Intro Text: 57.6% of Top Category Pages
57.6% of 92 ranking category pages with a detectable product grid show at least 20 words above the first product, with a median of 25 words.
On-Page SEO
Internal Anchor Text 2026: 81% Echo the Target's H1
81.0% of 76,500 sampled internal text links on 167 crawled sites use anchor text that shares at least one meaningful word with the target page's H1.
On-Page SEO
H2 Usage on #1 Results: 19.8% Have None
19.8% of 5,067 #1-ranking pages have no H2 heading, and the median #1 page has 4.
On-Page SEO
'Best' in Search Result Titles: 16.6% of Commercial Results
16.6% of 19,733 top-10 titles for commercial-intent keywords contain the word 'best', against 7.0% for informational and 2.9% for navigational keywords.
On-Page SEO
Homepage Title Rewrites: Sites Kept 88.3% of Organic Traffic
4,076 top-100K sites that changed their homepage title once kept a median 88.3% of their estimated organic traffic three to five months later, against 89.8% for 2,239 similar sites that never touched it.
On-Page SEO
Mobile Above-the-Fold Text: 10.1% of Ranking Store Pages Show Almost None
10.1% of 483 ranking store pages rendered on a phone show fewer than 10 words on the first screen, and the median first screen has 34 words outside the header and navigation.
On-Page SEO
'X vs Y' Comparison Tables: Only 26.1% of Top Results
Of 2,501 top-5 pages for 'vs' searches, 26.1% contain an HTML table, and only 21.2% of #1 results do.
Website Migration
Shopify Migration 404s 2026: 30.1% of Old Linked URLs
Of 14,596 backlinked URLs on 675 stores that moved to Shopify, 30.1% now return 404 or 410.
Website Migration
Magento Migration 404s: 35.4% of Old .html URLs
Of 577 backlinked .html URLs on 59 sites that left Magento for Shopify, 35.4% now return 404 or 410.
Website Migration
Website Death Rate: 1 in 5 of 2024's Top 1M Sites Have Vanished From Chrome's Data
22.1% of the sites in Chrome's top 1M in September 2024 have dropped out of Chrome UX data, and with 48.2% of a sample of those unreachable, up to 10.6% of 2024's top 1M no longer load at all.
Website Migration
Migration Redirects: 1 in 5 Redirected Old URLs Ends on a 404
Of 7,555 backlinked old URLs that now redirect on 633 sites that changed platform, 21.5% redirect to a page that returns 404 or 410.
Website Migration
Domain Changes: 42% of Domain Moves Lost Half Their Search Traffic
Across 50 sites that moved to a new domain, combined US search traffic three to five months later was a median 65.3% of what the old domain had before, and 42.0% lost more than half.
Website Migration
Killing a Blog Subdomain: The Median Site Lost Only 7.9% of Traffic
Across 438 sites whose blog subdomain traffic moved away in 2025 or early 2026, the median root domain had 92.1% of its previous organic traffic three to five months later.
Website Migration
WooCommerce to Shopify Speed: 26.1% to 57.6% Pass CWV
514 stores that moved from WooCommerce to Shopify went from a 26.1% Core Web Vitals pass rate to 57.6%, even though median page weight rose about 860 KB.
Website Migration
WordPress to Webflow Speed: 26.4% to 44.4% Pass CWV
72 sites that moved from WordPress to Webflow went from a 26.4% Core Web Vitals pass rate to 44.4%.
Website Migration
Headless Commerce Speed 2026: Pass Rate Falls to 19.0%
249 stores that moved from WooCommerce, Magento or Shopify to a Next.js front end went from a 34.7% Core Web Vitals pass rate to 19.0%.
Website Migration
Next.js Migration Speed: 31.4% to 28.5% Pass CWV
Across 1,226 sites that moved to Next.js, the Core Web Vitals pass rate went from 31.4% to 28.5%.
Website Migration
Moving to a JavaScript Framework: Nearly 1 in 4 Sites Lost Half Their HTML Text
23.6% of top 1M sites that moved to Next.js, Nuxt or Gatsby (350 of 1,480) lost more than half the words in the HTML their server sends, more than double the 10.5% for sites that switched to other platforms.
Website Migration
Migration Analytics Loss: 11.2% of Sites Drop Their Google Tag
11.2% of 4,057 top 1M sites that loaded Google Analytics or Google Tag Manager the month before a platform switch no longer loaded it the month after.
Website Migration
Migration Schema Loss 2026: 24.7% Drop Structured Data
Of 3,119 top 1M homepages with structured data the month before a platform switch, 24.7% had none the month after.
Website Migration
Migration Hreflang Loss: 31.6% Drop It After Launch
Of 1,113 top 1M homepages with rendered hreflang the month before a platform switch, 31.6% had none the month after.
Website Migration
43% of Homepages Hidden From Google Still Get Real Traffic
43.4% of the 12,177 top 1M homepages that carry a rendered noindex (5,282 homepages) get enough Chrome traffic to appear in the Chrome UX Report.
Website Migration
Post-Migration Sitemaps: 1.7x More Bad URLs Than Average
On redirects and client errors, 7.3% of sampled sitemap URLs on 361 replatformed sites are bad, against 4.3% on 219 comparison sites, a 1.7x gap. Adding canonical and noindex checks on a subsample, 11.4% of listed URLs should not be in the sitemap.
Website Migration
When Stores Replatform: 30.4% of 2025 Ecommerce Migrations Launched in Q3
In 2025, the only complete calendar year in the data, 30.4% of 1,075 ecommerce platform switches among top 1M sites launched in Q3, ahead of Q2 (26.9%), Q4 (21.9%) and Q1 (20.8%).
Website Migration
Migration Recovery: 57% of Sites That Dropped Hadn't Bounced Back
Of 982 sites with real US search traffic that changed platform, 48.1% dropped more than 10% in the first three months. Only 42.6% of those got back to 90% of their old traffic; the rest still had not after a median 12 months of data.
Website Migration
Backlinks Lost in Migration: Median Site Loses 23%
Across 659 sites that changed platform, the median site has 22.7% of the URLs other sites link to returning 404 or 410, and 46.9% of sites have more than a quarter of their linked URLs dead.
Website Migration
Page Builder Rebuilds: 25.3% of WordPress Sites With Good LCP Lost It
1,879 top 1M WordPress sites added a visual page builder. Of the 1,715 with real-user LCP data before and after, the share with a good LCP fell from 55.0% to 48.8% within three months, while WordPress sites that never used a builder held at 69.0% to 69.3%.
Website Migration
ccTLD to .com Moves: Half of Brands Lost 30%+ of Local Traffic
416 brands folded a country domain into their .com. Three to five months later, their combined search traffic in that country was a median 68.3% of what it was before, and 51.7% had lost more than 30%.
Website Migration
BigCommerce Migration 404s: 26.3% of Linked URLs Now Dead
Of 1,941 linked non-homepage URLs on 83 stores that left BigCommerce (all for Shopify), 26.3% return 404 or 410 and 57.2% redirect.
Website Migration
Review Schema Lost in Migration: 57.1% of Sites Drop It
Of 217 top 1M homepages with AggregateRating markup the month before a platform switch, 57.1% had none the month after.
Website Migration
Internal Links After Migration: 19.0% Lose Half
The median top 1M homepage has 3.1% fewer internal links after a platform switch, and 19.0% of 4,536 lose more than half.
Website Migration
Shopify Migration Image Weight: Up to 1.3MB Lighter
Median homepage image weight fell after every common ecommerce move to Shopify, from 307 KB lighter for stores leaving WooCommerce to 1,330 KB lighter for stores leaving BigCommerce, but added JavaScript meant most stores still got heavier overall.
Website Migration
Platform Migration Speed 2026: 23 Paths Ranked
Of 23 platform migration paths with 30 or more sites, the biggest Core Web Vitals gain came from BigCommerce to Shopify (+34.8 points, 91 sites) and the biggest loss from Shopify to Next.js (-28.2 points, 45 sites).
Website Maintenance
WordPress Version Statistics 2026: 18.7% Run Old Releases
Of 60,542 top 1M WordPress homepages exposing a version, 81.3% run one of the three newest releases (7.1, 7.0 or 6.9) and 18.7% run something older.
Website Maintenance
WordPress Block Theme Adoption: Only 32% of Sites
32.0% of WordPress homepages (2,816,450 of 8,802,973) have block-theme markup (the wp-site-blocks wrapper) in their page code.
Website Maintenance
Page Builder Market Share 2026: Elementor at 26.3%
Elementor markup appears in the page code of 26.3% of WordPress homepages (2,314,219 of 8,811,077), more than WPBakery (8.6%), Divi (6.8%) and Beaver Builder (1.5%) combined.
Website Maintenance
WooCommerce Version Statistics: 35.6% of Stores Run Old Releases
Of 17,311 top 1M WooCommerce stores exposing a version, 64.4% run 11.1, 11.0 or 10.9, while 35.6% (6,155) run an older release.
Website Maintenance
WordPress Plugin Count vs Speed: 9+ Plugins Pass 24%
Top 1M WordPress homepages with 0 to 2 detectable plugins pass Core Web Vitals 57.9% of the time, against 24.0% for those with 9 or more.
Website Maintenance
Core Web Vitals Decay 2026: 19.2% of Passers Now Fail
Of 127,675 top 1M sites that passed Core Web Vitals in Sept 2024, 19.2% (24,526) fail in Sept 2026, while 51,045 sites went from failing to passing.
Website Maintenance
Page Weight Growth 2026: Same Sites 11.2% Heavier
Across 423,847 top 1M sites crawled in both Sept 2024 and Sept 2026, the median homepage grew 11.2% (2,639 KB to 3,062 KB), and 40.1% grew by more than a quarter.
Website Maintenance
Missing File Statistics: 22.1% of Top 1M Pages Load a 404
22.1% of 1,401,418 top 1M pages (310,159) request at least one resource that returns a 404, and 5.6% (78,042) request a missing script or stylesheet.
Website Maintenance
Copyright Year Statistics 2026: 26.0% Still Show 2025
452,273 homepages carry a 'Copyright © 2025' line and no mention of 2026. Among homepages showing a 2025 or 2026 copyright line, 26.0% are still on 2025.
Website Maintenance
Lorem Ipsum Statistics: WordPress Sites 4x More Likely Than Shopify
'Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet' appears in the page code of 1.63% of WordPress homepages, against 0.39% of Shopify homepages, making WordPress sites 4.2x as likely to carry placeholder text.
Website Maintenance
Default WordPress Tagline: Still on 1 in 112 WordPress Sites
78,827 homepages still carry the default 'Just another WordPress site' tagline in their page code, 0.89% of 8,811,077 WordPress homepages, or about 1 in 112.
Website Maintenance
WordPress Version Exposure: 52.8% of WordPress Sites Show It
52.8% of top 1M WordPress homepages (60,079 of 113,804) publish their exact WordPress version in a generator meta tag.
Website Maintenance
XML-RPC Statistics 2026: 76.0% of WordPress Sites Advertise It
76.0% of top 1M WordPress homepages (86,494 of 113,804) link to xmlrpc.php in a link tag, and 25.7% still send a pingback link.
Website Maintenance
WordPress Emoji Script Usage: 36.3% Still Load It
36.3% of top 1M WordPress homepages (44,785 of 123,500) still load wp-emoji-release.min.js, an optional script most sites don't need.
Website Maintenance
admin-ajax.php Statistics: 13.1% of WordPress Homepages
13.1% of top 1M WordPress homepages (16,171 of 123,500) call admin-ajax.php during load before the visitor does anything, adding uncached server work.
Website Maintenance
Duplicate jQuery Statistics: 12.2% Load Two Copies
42,874 top 1M homepages load jQuery twice: 12.2% of the 350,642 homepages that load jQuery and 5.5% of all 782,850 top 1M homepages.
Website Maintenance
Broken Image Statistics 2026: 13.6% of Top 1M Pages
13.6% of 1,401,418 top 1M pages (190,923) request at least one image that fails with a 4xx or 5xx error.
Website Maintenance
Google+ Links in 2026: Still on 1 in 70 WordPress Sites
Google+ shut down in April 2019, yet plus.google.com still appears in the page code of 1.42% of WordPress homepages, about 1 in 70, against 0.66% of Shopify and 0.15% of Squarespace homepages.
Website Maintenance
Google Maps Errors: 1 in 38 Map Pages Break on a Billing or Key Error
Of 302 pages that loaded the Google Maps JavaScript API when we revisited them on Oct 19 2026, 2.6% (8) logged an error that stops the map loading properly and another 4.0% (12) logged key or version warnings.
Website Maintenance
Flash in 2026: 1 in 185 Websites Still Embed a Dead Plugin
215,839 homepages (0.54%) still contain 'application/x-shockwave-flash' in their page code, about 1 in 185, years after browsers dropped Flash.
Website Maintenance
Business Blog Activity 2026: 20.9% Silent for a Year
Of 3,482 blog feeds on sites ranking in Google's top 20, 20.9% have no post in the last 12 months, while the median site last posted 26 days before the crawl.
Website Maintenance
GA4 Double Counting 2026: 15.2% Fire Two Page Views
15.2% of top 1M homepages that send a GA4 page_view (30,072 of 197,489) fire it two or more times on one load, though most of those send the hits to two different GA4 properties.
Website Maintenance
Server Version Disclosure: 14.8% of Top 1M Sites
14.8% of top 1M homepages that send a Server header (101,917 of 688,733) include a version number, and 74,068 send their PHP version in X-Powered-By, 29,155 of them on PHP 5 or 7.
Website Maintenance
HTTP/3 Adoption 2026: 21.6% of Top 1M Sites
21.6% of top 1M homepages (168,654 of 782,570) load over HTTP/3, 61.7% over HTTP/2 and 16.7% still over HTTP/1.1, while 40.4% advertise HTTP/3.
Website Maintenance
Favicon Statistics 2026: 14.1% of Top 1M Sites Declare No Icon
14.1% of top 1M homepages (110,056 of 782,850) declare no icon link, though nearly all of them still get a favicon through the browser's fallback.
Website Maintenance
WooCommerce Plugin Count: Median Store Runs 5
The median top 1M WooCommerce store runs 5 detectable plugins, against 3 for WordPress homepages overall, and stores with 9 or more pass Core Web Vitals only 20.9% of the time.
Website Maintenance
WordPress Upload Size: Images Doubled in Weight in One Year
Original-size WordPress images uploaded in 2026 and served on top 1M pages have a median of 71.8 KB, against 17.7 KB for 2020 uploads still in use and 26.5 KB for 2024 uploads.
Cro
Mobile Add to Cart Placement: 82.2% Below the Fold
On 152 ranking product pages with a detectable buy button, rendered on a phone-sized screen, the Add to Cart button starts below the first screen 82.2% of the time.
Cro
BNPL Market Share 2026: Shop Pay Installments 9x Klarna
Shop Pay Installments appears on 27,943 of 40.3M homepages crawled in 2026, against 3,143 for Klarna, 1,881 for Afterpay and 1,583 for Affirm.
Cro
Email Signup Tools: Klaviyo Outnumbers Justuno and Privy 30 to 1
Klaviyo appears on 159,251 of 40.3M homepages crawled in 2026, against 3,680 for Justuno and 1,472 for Privy.
Cro
Email Popups: 97% of Ranking Stores Skip Them on a First Visit
Loaded on a phone, 3.3% of 246 ranking store homepages (8) showed an email signup popup within 15 seconds and a scroll, and 6.9% showed any popup at all.
Cro
Free Shipping Thresholds 2026: $85 Median
Of 538 US-dollar free shipping thresholds stated in the shipping policies of ranking Shopify stores, the median is $85, with the middle half between $50 and $100.
Cro
Return Policy Statistics: 30 Days at 59.2% of Shopify Stores
Among 4,397 ranking Shopify store refund policies that state a return window, the median is 30 days, used by 59.2% of stores.
Cro
Return Fee Statistics 2026: 40.8% of Shopify Stores Charge
Of 4,908 readable refund policies from ranking Shopify stores, 40.8% charge a restocking fee, make the customer pay return shipping, or both.
Cro
Mobile Popup and Banner Clutter: 8.5% of Store Homepages Cover 25%+
On 246 ranking store homepages rendered on a phone, fixed banners, cookie notices and popups cover a median 7.1% of the first screen; 8.5% cover more than a quarter and 4.1% more than half.
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Hero Video Speed 2026: 42.1% Pass CWV vs 48.1% Text
Top 1M homepages whose largest element is a video pass Core Web Vitals 42.1% of the time, against 44.5% for image heroes and 48.1% for text, while CSS background-image heroes do worst at 35.1%.
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Back Button Speed 2026: Shopify 64.3%, Other Store Platforms 22.7%
On phones, 64.3% of back and forward navigations on Shopify stores are served instantly from the back/forward cache, against 56.0% on WooCommerce and 22.7% across nine other store platforms.
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Speculation Rules 2026: 89.8% of Top 1M Shopify Stores
Speculation rules for instant page loads are on 89.8% of top 1M Shopify homepages and 90.6% of WooCommerce homepages, pushed by platform defaults, against 20.5% of the top 1M overall.
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CAPTCHA Market Share 2026: reCAPTCHA Outnumbers Rivals 8 to 1
reCAPTCHA appears on 1,580,818 of 40.3M homepages crawled in 2026, against 107,207 for Cloudflare Turnstile and 78,873 for hCaptcha.
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Booking Widget Market Share 2026: Calendly 3x Acuity
Calendly appears on 23,990 of 40.3M homepages crawled in 2026, against 7,396 for Acuity Scheduling and 4,323 for HubSpot Meetings.
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Shopify Theme Market Share 2026: Dawn at 18.1%
Dawn runs on 18.1% of 813,530 Shopify homepages (147,406), and the 15 most common themes together cover 50.8% of stores.
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Black Friday Speed: 22% of Stores Slowed in Nov 2025
Comparing 64,469 online stores in October and November 2025, 22.1% had a 5% or more slower LCP in November, while the median store got slightly faster (-24 ms).
Cro
Holiday JavaScript Bloat: 26.4% of Stores Add 10%+
Between September and December 2025, 26.4% of 58,735 online stores grew their homepage JavaScript by more than 10%, while the median store grew 3.3%.
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Delivery Date Statistics: Only 6.0% of Product Pages
Only 6.0% of 302 ranking product pages rendered on a phone show a delivery date or delivery window.
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Product Photo Statistics: Median of 6 per Product
The median ranking product page with a detectable gallery shows 6 distinct product images, and 16.7% show just one.
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Express Checkout Adoption 2026: 17.1% of Product Pages
17.1% of 269 ranking product pages rendered on a phone show an express wallet button such as Shop Pay, PayPal, Google Pay or Apple Pay.
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WooCommerce Cart Fragments: 45.0% of Stores Fire Them
45.0% of top 1M WooCommerce store homepages (9,889 of 21,999) fire the get_refreshed_fragments cart request on load, an uncached AJAX call.
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Product Photos on Phones: 82.9% of Main Images Load Under 100 KB
On 199 ranking product pages loaded on a phone where the largest element was a matched image, the main product image weighed a median 35.7 KB and 82.9% came in under 100 KB.
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Trust Badge Statistics: Only 7.3% of Product Pages
Only 7.3% of 302 ranking product pages rendered on a phone show a security or payment trust badge or a secure checkout message.
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Mobile Search UX 2026: 55.7% Hide Search in an Icon
On a phone screen, 55.7% of 246 ranking store homepages hide search behind an icon, 32.1% show a visible search box and 4.9% have no search at all.
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Homepage Hero Statistics 2026: Images Lead at 49.6%
The largest element on 49.6% of 738,473 top 1M homepages is an image, ahead of text (23.2%), CSS background images (16.9%), text blocks (6.2%) and video (1.9%).
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Review App Market Share 2026: Judge.me 5.5x Loox
Judge.me appears on 136,959 of 40.3M homepages crawled in 2026, against 24,822 for Loox, 24,380 for Yotpo, 13,615 for Stamped and 4,636 for Okendo.
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Product Recommendation Speed: 56.2% vs 48.4% Pass CWV
Top 1M stores with a product recommendation engine pass Core Web Vitals 56.2% of the time against 48.4% without, despite carrying about twice the JavaScript, though most of the gap comes from platform mix.
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Cart Drawer Adoption: 69.4% of Ranking Shopify Stores Use One
69.4% of 5,509 Shopify stores ranking in Google's top 20 have a slide-out cart drawer in their homepage code.
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Mobile Price Visibility: 33.5% Hidden Below the Fold
On 179 ranking product pages with a detectable price, 66.5% show it on the first phone screen and 33.5% make shoppers scroll.
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Store 404 Pages: 4 in 5 Link to Zero Products in Their HTML
We requested a made-up URL on 812 ranking online stores. Of the 742 that returned a 404 or 410 error page, 80.5% had no product links in the page HTML.
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Session Recording Adoption 2026: 14.2% of Top 1M Sites
111,041 top 1M homepages (14.2% of 782,850) load a session recording or heatmap tool, and they pass Core Web Vitals 39.1% of the time against 43.3% without.
Cro
Form Builder Share 2026: Jotform Leads HubSpot Forms 1.4 to 1
Jotform appears on 33,550 of 40.3M homepages crawled in 2026, against 24,636 for HubSpot Forms and 6,268 for Typeform.
Local
Local Business Website Speed: 52.2% of 'Near Me' Winners Pass Core Web Vitals
We pulled the local businesses ranking for 'near me' searches across six cities and measured their Core Web Vitals. 52% pass, held back by loading: only 69.6% have a good LCP and the median site takes 2.2 seconds to paint its main content.
AI Search
Sites Cited in AI Overviews Pass Core Web Vitals 56.8% of the Time vs 40% Web-Wide
We pulled every page Google's AI Overview cited across 13 common questions and measured how fast each one is. A clear majority, 56.8%, pass Core Web Vitals, against roughly 40% for the web as a whole.
Nonprofit
Nonprofit Website Speed: Two in Three Fail Core Web Vitals
We measured every nonprofit site running real donation software. They are responsive and stable, but only 33.4% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile, because half of them load too slowly, and the slow page is the donate page.
Finance
Bank and Credit Union Website Speed: Local CUs Pass 57.4%, Megabanks 39%
We measured 108 local credit unions, community banks, and advisory firms across 32 US metros. 57.4% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile, well ahead of the big national banks, where only 39% pass. The local institution's site is the faster one.
News
News Website Speed: the Biggest Outlets Pass Core Web Vitals 80% of the Time
Are news sites bloated and slow? We measured 49 major outlets. 80% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile, ahead of every other sector we measured and roughly eight times the software industry's rate. The failures are the prestige titles, undone by ad-driven layout shift.
Real Estate
Real Estate Website Speed: Only 40.2% of Local Sites Pass Core Web Vitals
We measured 117 local real estate brokerages and agent sites across 32 US metros. Only 40% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile, and the culprit is the embedded map and listing-search widget.
Education
University Website Speed: Fewer Than Half of .edu Sites Pass Core Web Vitals
We measured every .edu site Google has field data for. Only 48.3% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile. Higher education builds stable, responsive pages that are slow to load, and the enormous long tail of department and course sites is why.
Healthcare
Healthcare Website Speed: 66.5% of Local Practices Pass Core Web Vitals
We measured 158 local medical practices, from dentists to dermatologists to family doctors, across 32 US metros. 66.5% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile, well ahead of the big hospital systems and insurers.
Legal
Law Firm Website Speed: Only 48.4% of Local Firms Pass Core Web Vitals
We measured 186 local law firms across 32 US metros. Only 48% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile, and the culprit is the marketing stack a local firm bolts onto its homepage.
Restaurants
Restaurant Website Speed: 71.5% Pass Core Web Vitals, but Chains Manage 38%
We measured 10,020 restaurant websites built on dedicated restaurant platforms. 72% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile with a median load of 1.2 seconds, while the app-heavy national chains are the slower ones.
Retail
Ecommerce Core Web Vitals: the Biggest Stores Pass 36%, the Smallest 65%
We ranked online stores by popularity and expected the biggest, best-funded retailers to lead. Google's field data runs the other way: just 36% of the top stores pass on mobile, versus about 65% of the small ones, and the whole difference is responsiveness.
Benchmarks
Core Web Vitals by Site Popularity: the Top 1,000 Pass 64.7%, the Long Tail 39.2%
We split every site Google measures into traffic-popularity tiers. The top 1,000 pass on 64.7% of mobile origins, the tail beyond one million just 39.2%. But on mobile the top tier is far less responsive than the long tail.
Platforms
Headless CMS Performance: No Platform Beats Wix's 53% Pass Rate
"Headless is faster" is a common claim. The field data on 23,747 origins shows Sanity and Prismic passing Core Web Vitals just above average, Contentful right at it, and none matching the fastest hosted builders around 53%.
Hosting
Web Hosting Speed Compared: Pantheon Passes 61.2%, Bluehost 30.4%
We grouped roughly 11 million sites by hosting provider and measured real-user field data. The best host (Pantheon, 61% pass) beats the worst (Bluehost, 30%) two to one, with managed WordPress on top and budget shared hosting at the bottom.
Benchmarks
51.3% of Sites Have a Good TTFB - the Slow Ones Pass LCP Just 6.3% of the Time
What is a good Time To First Byte, and how much does it matter? We checked TTFB across 10.6 million sites and found it sets the ceiling for loading speed: fast-server sites pass LCP 85.3% of the time, slow-server sites just 6.3%.
CMS
WordPress Passes Core Web Vitals Least Often of Any Major CMS, at 38.4%
WordPress runs more of the web than every other CMS combined, and passes Google's Core Web Vitals on mobile just 38.4% of the time, the lowest of any major platform. The reason is loading, not responsiveness.
WordPress
Only 38.4% of WordPress Sites Pass Core Web Vitals
Is WordPress really slow? We checked the Core Web Vitals of nearly 3 million WordPress sites against the rest of the web. WordPress passes 38.4% of the time versus 44.1% for everything else, and the entire gap is load time. On responsiveness and stability, WordPress wins.
WordPress
Elementor Is the Slowest Major WordPress Page Builder, Passing on 30% of Sites
We matched Chrome field data to the page builder running on more than two million WordPress sites. Elementor, the most-used builder, passes Core Web Vitals on just 30.0% of mobile sites, below native Gutenberg's 41.5%, and the problem is loading, not responsiveness.
Frameworks
The Fastest JavaScript Framework Isn't React, Vue or Angular - Alpine.js Passes 56.3%
We matched Chrome field data to the JavaScript framework running on 3.5 million-plus sites. React, Vue and Angular each pass Core Web Vitals on about a third of mobile sites, below the web-wide average, while lighter frameworks like Svelte and Alpine.js pass far more often, and the gap shows up on responsiveness.
Frameworks
Astro Passes Core Web Vitals on 48% of Sites. Next.js Manages 29.3%
We matched Chrome field data to the meta-framework running on 490,000 sites. Astro passes Core Web Vitals on 48% of mobile sites, Next.js on 29%, Nuxt on 25%. The frameworks that ship less JavaScript to the browser win, and the gap is mostly responsiveness.
Frameworks
Static Site Generators Compared: Hugo and Jekyll Hit 90% Good LCP, Next.js 29%
True static generators like Hugo and Jekyll have the best loading scores on the web (good LCP near 90%), but the JavaScript tools that share the "static" label (Next.js, Nuxt, Gatsby) pass Core Web Vitals far less often.
Page Weight
The Average Page Size Is 2.6MB, Across 71 Requests
We measured 15.7 million web pages. The median weighs 2.6MB and makes 71 requests, and across the whole range total weight barely predicts whether a site passes Core Web Vitals.
Metrics
Two-Thirds of Failing Sites Fail on Just One Metric, Usually LCP
We analyzed how sites fail Core Web Vitals. Two-thirds of failing sites fail on just one of the three metrics, so most are a single fix from passing. On mobile that fix is usually loading.
Metrics
INP on Mobile vs Desktop: 97.9% of Desktop Sites Pass, Only 82.5% on Mobile
We measured Interaction to Next Paint across 18 million websites. On desktop it is all but solved, with 97.9% passing. On mobile just 82.5% do, the widest device gap of any Core Web Vital.
Trends
The Median Page Load Time Is Now 2.0 Seconds, Down From 2.7 in 2020
Has the web actually gotten faster? We tracked real-user Core Web Vitals across six years. The median mobile site now loads in 2.0 seconds, taps answer in 100ms, and 87% of sites are visually stable. Every metric improved.
Page Weight
WebP Reached 16.6% of All Web Images. JPEG and PNG Still Hold 53%
We classified 435 million web images and tracked four years of change. WebP went from 2% to 17% of all images since 2022 and now appears on 40% of homepages, AVIF grew fortyfold but sits at just 4%, and JPEG and PNG together are still more than half of every image on the web.
Web Fonts
Google Fonts Costs 9 Points of Good LCP
We checked web fonts across 9.5 million sites. Those loading Google Fonts are good on LCP just 63% of the time on mobile versus 72% without, a 9-point loading penalty. Web fonts are a real loading cost, and here is how to keep it small.
CSS
Bootstrap Passes Core Web Vitals on 45.7% of Mobile Sites. Tailwind Manages 36.8%
We matched Chrome field data to the CSS framework on 3 million sites. Bootstrap sites pass Core Web Vitals more often than Tailwind sites on mobile (45.7% vs 36.8%), but the difference is not the CSS. It is the JavaScript stack each framework travels with.
Frameworks
64% of the Mobile Web Still Runs jQuery, and Those Sites Are Faster
jQuery is supposed to be the slow legacy library you should drop. We checked 9.5 million sites: the ones still running it pass Core Web Vitals more often on mobile (44.2% vs 39.0%) than the ones without it, because the sites that dropped it moved to heavier frameworks.
Third-Party Scripts
Social Embeds Cost 8.6 Points of Good LCP
Sites running embedded third-party widgets pass Core Web Vitals on 38.7% of mobile origins versus 42.7% without, with an 8.6-point loading penalty.
Third-Party Scripts
A/B Testing Tools Cost 10.2 Points of Good LCP, the Worst of Any Third-Party Category
Sites running an A/B testing tool are good on LCP just 58.5% of the time on mobile versus 68.7% without, a 10-point loading penalty and the steepest of any third-party category we measured.
Third-Party Scripts
Live Chat Widgets Cost 9.5 Points of Good LCP
Sites running a live-chat widget pass Core Web Vitals on 37.6% of mobile origins versus 43.3% without, and loading takes the biggest hit, with good-LCP dropping nearly 10 points.
Third-Party Scripts
Google Tag Manager Costs 5.3 Points of Good LCP
Tag-managed sites are good on LCP about 5 points less often on mobile, yet they pass Core Web Vitals at nearly the same overall rate, because they tend to be better-maintained sites.
Third-Party Scripts
Cookie Banners Cost 3.7 Points of LCP, Yet Those Sites Pass Core Web Vitals More Often
Cookie consent banners add a real loading cost, with good-LCP down 3.7 points on mobile. Yet the sites that run them pass Core Web Vitals more often overall, because consent tools cluster on better-built sites.
SEO
Page Speed and Google Rankings: Page One Passes Core Web Vitals 47.6% vs 44.2% on Page Two
Page-one results pass Core Web Vitals 47.6% of the time vs 44.2% on page two; among competitive sites the gap widens to 7.6 points.
Benchmarks
Mobile vs Desktop Speed: 84% of the Top 500 Sites Are Slower on Mobile
84% of the top 500 sites load slower on mobile than desktop, and only 44% pass Core Web Vitals on mobile vs 64% on desktop.
Trends
The Average Website Loads 375KB of Third-Party JavaScript
Third-party JavaScript on the median mobile page grew from 255 KB in 2020 to 375 KB in 2024, roughly two-thirds of all JS on a typical page.
Global
Website Speed by Country: Sweden Passes 70.8%, Nigeria 7.8%
In Sweden, 70.8% of sites pass Core Web Vitals on mobile. In Nigeria, just 7.8% do, a 63-point spread across 40 countries.
Benchmarks
49.1% of the Mobile Web Passes Core Web Vitals in 2026
49.1% of the mobile web and 58.0% of the desktop web pass all three Core Web Vitals in May 2026.
Benchmarks
Website Speed by Industry: Government Passes 78.9%, Tech and SaaS 10%
Government and healthcare lead at 78.9% mobile pass; Technology & SaaS lags at 10.0%, a 69-point industry spread.
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