TTFB: what time-to-first-byte tells you about your host
TTFB is the cleanest single metric for comparing hosts. Here's what it measures, what's good, and what to do when yours is bad.
What TTFB actually measures
Time-to-first-byte is the gap between a browser sending a request and receiving the first byte of the response. It captures DNS lookup, connection setup, server processing, and network return — basically everything before rendering can start.
It's the single best signal of how fast your origin is, independent of how heavy your front-end code is.
What's a good TTFB number
Under 200ms: excellent. 200-500ms: acceptable. 500ms-1s: slow — you'll see Core Web Vitals impact. Over 1s: something is wrong.
Google's PageSpeed Insights and webpagetest.org both report TTFB. Run from a location near your target audience for a meaningful number.
Fixing slow TTFB
Server-side caching cuts TTFB more than any other change. On WordPress, full-page caching often brings a 1.5s TTFB down to under 100ms.
If you're already cached and still slow, the host is the problem. That's the moment to migrate — no plugin will fix a slow shared server with 800 sites on it.
Questions readers ask about this topic
Does TTFB affect SEO?
Is TTFB the same as page load time?
Why does my TTFB vary so much?
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