WordPress.org

ⵜⴰⵎⴰⵣⵉⵖⵜ

Get WordPress
WordPress.org

Plugin Directory

PlugoSpeed

PlugoSpeed

By plugopress
Download

Description

PlugoSpeed is a WordPress performance plugin that combines page caching, asset optimization, and Core Web Vitals improvements in a single lightweight package.

It generates static HTML cache files served directly from disk via Apache — bypassing PHP and WordPress on cached requests. In testing on a standard VPS, this approach achieves sub-50ms TTFB and PageSpeed scores of 95/100 on desktop.

A React 18 dashboard provides real-time cache hit rates, bandwidth saved, and PageSpeed score tracking — no jQuery required.

Core Features (Free)

Static HTML Cache
Pages are stored as static .html files on disk. Apache serves them directly — no PHP, no database, no WordPress bootstrap. Cache TTL is configurable (default: 24 hours).

HTML Minification
Removes unnecessary whitespace and comments from the final HTML output, reducing page size without affecting content or functionality.

CSS Minification
Minifies stylesheet files inline, reducing transfer size. Combine is intentionally disabled by default for HTTP/2 compatibility.

JavaScript Defer
Adds defer to non-critical scripts, improving Time to Interactive (TTI) and Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) scores on mobile.

Image Lazy Loading
Adds native loading="lazy" to images and iframes below the fold. Injects explicit width and height attributes to reduce Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS).

Database Cleanup
Scheduled cleanup of post revisions, auto-drafts, spam comments, and expired transients. Configurable schedule: daily, weekly, or monthly.

Cache Preloading
After purge, PlugoSpeed re-warms the cache automatically by walking your XML sitemap. Rate-limited to avoid server overload.

Auto Cache Purge
Cache is invalidated on post save, theme change, plugin activation, and WooCommerce stock/price updates.

PageSpeed Dashboard
Tracks your Google PageSpeed Insights score over time with a 30-day graph. Shows live cache hit/miss ratio, bandwidth saved, and page count.

Pro Features

Remove Unused CSS (RUCSS)
Generates a per-page stylesheet containing only the CSS rules that are actually used. Eliminates render-blocking CSS from page builders and plugin stylesheets. Requires a PlugoPress API key.

Critical CSS
Inlines the above-the-fold CSS directly in <head>, eliminating render-blocking for a faster LCP. Requires a PlugoPress API key.

WebP Image Serving
Automatically serves .webp versions of images to supported browsers, reducing image payload by 25–35% without quality loss.

Upgrade to Pro plugopress.com/plugospeed/

Compatibility

PlugoSpeed is tested and verified compatible with:

Page Builders: Elementor, Divi, Beaver Builder, Bricks, Oxygen, WPBakery
Themes: Astra, GeneratePress, Kadence, Hello Elementor, OceanWP, Blocksy, Neve, Flatsome
E-Commerce: WooCommerce (cart exclusion, stock purge, vary by currency)
Multilingual: WPML, Polylang (vary cache by language)
SEO: Rank Math, Yoast SEO, All in One SEO
CDN: Cloudflare (Pro: API purge integration)

Technical Highlights

  • Apache .htaccess rules serve cached HTML at low TTFB — before PHP loads
  • advanced-cache.php drop-in captures misses and writes cache files
  • Optimizer pipeline: Image JS CSS HTML (order matters for correctness)
  • WooCommerce cart/checkout pages are automatically excluded from cache
  • Logged-in users never receive cached pages (preserves nonces and personalisation)
  • Action Scheduler handles background jobs (preload, cleanup, RUCSS generation)
  • REST API powers the dashboard — all actions are nonce-protected with manage_options capability checks

Links

External Services

This plugin connects to the following external services:

Google PageSpeed Insights API

  • Purpose: Measures your site’s performance score and Core Web Vitals (LCP, CLS, FID)
  • When it is called: Only when viewing the PlugoSpeed dashboard or when a manual refresh is triggered by the site administrator
  • Data transmitted: Your site’s public URL — no personal data is sent
  • Terms of Service: https://developers.google.com/terms
  • Privacy Policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy

PlugoPress Cloud API (api.plugopress.com)

  • Purpose: Powers Pro features: Remove Unused CSS (RUCSS) and Critical CSS generation
  • When it is called: Only when a valid API key is configured by the site administrator AND the corresponding Pro feature is enabled
  • Data transmitted: The page URL and rendered HTML of the requested page, used solely for CSS analysis
  • Terms of Service: https://plugopress.com/terms
  • Privacy Policy: https://plugopress.com/privacy-policy

PlugoPress Badge Service (plugopress.com)

  • Purpose: Displays a performance badge in the PlugoSpeed dashboard
  • When it is called: When the dashboard is viewed and a PageSpeed score is available
  • Data transmitted: Only the numeric PageSpeed score is included in the image URL — no personal data is sent
  • Terms of Service: https://plugopress.com/terms
  • Privacy Policy: https://plugopress.com/privacy-policy

Screenshots

  • Dashboard Tab — Performance score, live cache hit rate, Core Web Vitals, bandwidth saved, and quick action buttons.
  • Cache Tab — Cache statistics, purge controls, TTL configuration, and URL exclusion management.
  • Optimize Tab — HTML, CSS, and JavaScript optimization toggles with Pro feature indicators.
  • Images Tab — Lazy load, dimension injection, and WebP serving controls.
  • Database Tab — Cleanup item selection, schedule configuration, and one-click manual run.

Installation

Automatic Installation

  1. Go to Plugins Add New in your WordPress admin
  2. Search for PlugoSpeed
  3. Click Install Now, then Activate
  4. Navigate to Settings PlugoSpeed to review defaults

That’s it. Caching is active immediately after activation.

Manual Installation

  1. Download the .zip from plugopress.com/plugospeed/ or WordPress.org
  2. Go to Plugins Add New Upload Plugin
  3. Upload the .zip and click Install Now
  4. Click Activate Plugin

After Activation

PlugoSpeed works with zero configuration. The defaults are conservative and safe:

  • Cache TTL: 24 hours
  • HTML minification: enabled
  • CSS minification: enabled
  • JS defer: enabled
  • Image lazy load: enabled
  • Database cleanup: weekly

You can adjust any setting from the PlugoSpeed dashboard under your WordPress admin menu.

Requirements

  • WordPress 6.2 or higher
  • PHP 7.4 or higher (PHP 8.0+ recommended)
  • Apache 2.4+ with mod_rewrite enabled
  • Write permissions on wp-content/cache/

FAQ

Will PlugoSpeed conflict with my existing caching plugin?

Yes — you should deactivate any other caching plugin before activating PlugoSpeed. Running two caching plugins simultaneously causes conflicts. PlugoSpeed detects an existing advanced-cache.php drop-in and will warn you if it cannot safely install its own.

Does it work with Elementor?

Yes. PlugoSpeed includes a dedicated Elementor integration. The cache is automatically purged when you save a page in Elementor. The Elementor editor itself is excluded from caching to prevent interference with its preview mode.

Does it work with WooCommerce?

Yes. Cart, checkout, account, and order pages are automatically excluded from the static cache. Product pages are cached and purged automatically when stock levels or prices change. WooCommerce currency cookies create separate cache variants when needed.

My page builder styles look broken after enabling CSS minification. What do I do?

Try disabling CSS Combine first (it is off by default). If the issue persists, you can disable CSS minification entirely from the Optimize tab. For fine-grained control, use the URL exclusion list in Cache settings to exclude specific pages.

Why is my admin bar not visible on cached pages?

It is. The WordPress admin bar is rendered client-side for logged-in users. Logged-in users are never served cached pages — they always receive a fresh, dynamic response from WordPress. If you are logged in and not seeing the admin bar, check your theme or another plugin.

How does preloading work?

After a full cache purge, PlugoSpeed queues a background job via Action Scheduler. That job walks your XML sitemap and visits each URL using a PlugoSpeed/Preload user agent. Each visit triggers advanced-cache.php to generate and write the cache file. The preloader is rate-limited to 10 pages/second to avoid server overload.

Does it support Nginx?

Phase 1 supports Apache only. Nginx support is on the roadmap for Phase 2. If you use Nginx, the PHP-level caching (via advanced-cache.php) still works and provides significant improvement over no caching — you just won’t get the Apache-level static file serving bypass.

Where are cached files stored?

In wp-content/cache/plugospeed/{hostname}/{path}/default/index.html. The directory structure mirrors your site’s URL structure. You can safely delete this entire folder — PlugoSpeed will recreate it as pages are visited.

What permissions does the cache directory need?

wp-content/cache/plugospeed/ must be writable by the web server user (typically www-data on Ubuntu/Debian, apache on CentOS). PlugoSpeed attempts to create the directory with correct permissions on activation.

Does it support multisite?

Multisite support is planned for Phase 2. Single-site installations are fully supported.

I enabled RUCSS and my site looks broken.

RUCSS is a Pro feature that generates per-page stylesheets using a headless browser. If the generated CSS is incorrect, PlugoSpeed silently falls back to the original stylesheet — your site will never be left broken. You can also purge the RUCSS cache from the Tools tab to regenerate it.

How do I completely remove PlugoSpeed?

Deactivating the plugin removes the advanced-cache.php drop-in, removes the PlugoSpeed block from .htaccess, and deletes all cached files. Uninstalling via Plugins Delete additionally removes the database tables and the plugospeed_settings option from wp_options.

Is there a WP-CLI interface?

Yes. Full WP-CLI support is included:

wp plugospeed purge [--all|--url=<url>|--post=<id>]
wp plugospeed preload [--sitemap=<url>]
wp plugospeed stats [--date=<YYYY-MM-DD>]
wp plugospeed settings [get|set|reset] [<key>] [<value>]
wp plugospeed cloud [validate|refresh]
wp plugospeed debug [on|off]

Reviews

There are no reviews for this plugin.

Contributors & Developers

“PlugoSpeed” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Contributors

Translate “PlugoSpeed” into your language.

Interested in development?

Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.

Changelog

1.1.0

  • Added Bloat tab with WordPress bloat removal (disable emojis, jQuery Migrate free; 11 Pro features)
  • Added Settings tab (Cloud API key, Admin Bar toggle, Notifications toggle)
  • Added optional Google PSI API key support via PLUGOSPEED_PSI_API_KEY constant
  • Fixed: CSS sanitization with wp_strip_all_tags() before wp_add_inline_style()
  • Fixed: $_SERVER sanitization in RUCSSService, CriticalCSSService, Elementor integration
  • Fixed: Menu position changed from 2 to 81
  • Fixed: .wordpress-org excluded from distribution zip

1.0.0

  • Initial release

Meta

Ratings

No reviews have been submitted yet.

Your review

See all reviews

Contributors

Support

Got something to say? Need help?

View support forum