www.billboard.com speed test — 20 Oct 2026

Measured from the wfix.shop server on 20 October 2026 at 13:31 UTC. Grade B (81/100), with the screenshots, the timings and the fixes that matter.

https://www.billboard.com/

20 October 2026 at 13:31 UTC · Free test · report pt_d1277da0dc66
Grade
B
81/100
Performance92/100
Structure65/100

9 audit(s) passed, 7 need work

First byte (TTFB)257 msmeasured from this server
Fully loaded1.55 sfirst byte + slowest asset
Requests26document + assets
Page weight1.59 MBcompressed transfer
HTML document267.9 KBbr
ProtocolHTTP/3nginx
Third-party230.2 KBother hosts

Where the first byte went

  • DNS lookup 80 ms 31%
  • TCP connect 46 ms 18%
  • Server wait 131 ms 51%

Measured on the connection that fetched the HTML. Every other request on the page waits for the end of this bar before it can start.

How this page compares

First bytefaster than 83% of 4,999 pages tested here257 ms against a median of 449 ms
Page weightheavier than 76% of 4,999 pages tested here1.59 MB against a median of 650.3 KB
Fully loadedfaster than 67% of 4,999 pages tested here1.55 s against a median of 1.84 s
Requestssends more requests than 100% of 4,999 pages tested here26 against a median of 26

Every report published here is in this comparison, so it is a reference population of pages tested from one server - not a benchmark of the whole web.

What these numbers mean

  • The first byte arrived in 257 ms. That is workable, and the cheapest win left is caching or a warmer connection.
  • The page transfers 1.59 MB over 26 request(s). Images files are 68% of it, so resize and recompress the largest images before anything else.
  • The HTML itself arrives br-compressed.
  • It runs over HTTP/3, so the assets share a connection instead of opening one each.

Fix first: Image delivery and format - Serve WebP or AVIF with a JPEG fallback, size images to the space they occupy, and lazy-load anything below the fold. Images are usually more than half of a slow page.

Read on one shared server, not a visitor's phone: use it to compare pages against each other, not as a promise about every connection. We fix what these tests find.

No screenshot for this report.

The headless browser did not capture this page when the test ran, so only the server measurements are shown.

Page weight by type

What the page is made of

Images 4 requests
1.08 MB 68%
Javascript 20 requests
253.4 KB 16%
Other 1 request
19 B 0%

Transfer size, compressed as sent. 26 request(s) in total, 1.59 MB across all of them.

Top issues

Image delivery and format

high impact

1 image(s) over 200 KB and 0 large image(s) still served as JPEG or PNG.

Fix: Serve WebP or AVIF with a JPEG fallback, size images to the space they occupy, and lazy-load anything below the fold. Images are usually more than half of a slow page.

Render-blocking resources

high impact

37 render-blocking resource(s) in the document head (9 script(s), 28 stylesheet(s)). The page cannot paint until each one arrives.

Fix: Add defer or async to scripts that do not change the first paint, inline the critical CSS, and load the rest with media="print" plus an onload swap.

Total page weight

medium impact

The page transfers 1.59 MB across 26 request(s), with the document itself at 267.9 KB.

Fix: Work through the heaviest assets first: images, then fonts, then third-party scripts.

Cache static assets

medium impact

2 asset(s) answer without a Cache-Control max-age, so browsers revalidate them on every visit.

Fix: Version filenames on change and serve them with a long max-age plus immutable. That is what makes a returning visitor fast.

HTML document size

medium impact

The document transfers 267.9 KB. A bloated document delays every other request, because nothing else can start until it is parsed.

Fix: Paginate long listings, move repeated markup into a template, and stop inlining large data URIs into the HTML.

Waterfall

Slowest requests

JAVASCRIPTwww.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-pia…
1.29 s
JAVASCRIPTiabusprivacy.pmc.com/geo-info.js
1.03 s
OTHERpixel.quantserve.com/pixel
1.02 s
JAVASCRIPTcdn.cookielaw.org/scripttemplates/otSDKStub.js
1.02 s
JAVASCRIPTwww.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-glo…
1.02 s
JAVASCRIPTcdn.cookielaw.org/opt-out/otCCPAiab.js
1.02 s
JAVASCRIPTwww.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-glo…
1.02 s
JAVASCRIPTexperiments.parsely.com/vip-experiments.js
1.00 s
IMAGEScdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0237/2843/products/2020_04_5…
1.00 s
IMAGESsb.scorecardresearch.com/p
984 ms

Each bar is one request's own response time, scaled to the slowest. Assets were fetched in parallel, so the bars overlap in real time rather than stacking. first party third party

RequestTypeStatusTimeSize
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-piano/assets/build/wordpress.js?ver=d35dd0b0dcac489798e8javascript2001.29 s8.6 KB
https://iabusprivacy.pmc.com/geo-info.js 3rd partyjavascript2001.03 s108 B
https://pixel.quantserve.com/pixel?a.1=&a.2=p-31f3D02tYU8zY 3rd partyother4051.02 s19 B
https://cdn.cookielaw.org/scripttemplates/otSDKStub.js 3rd partyjavascript2001.02 s13.6 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-global-functions/js/pmc-consent.min.js?ver=2024.05.18.001javascript2001.02 s397 B
https://cdn.cookielaw.org/opt-out/otCCPAiab.js 3rd partyjavascript2001.02 s5.8 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-global-functions/js/pmc-utils.min.js?ver=2024.05.18.001javascript2001.02 s2.7 KB
https://experiments.parsely.com/vip-experiments.js?apiKey=billboard.com&data-enable-live-updates=true 3rd partyjavascript2001.00 s8.7 KB
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0237/2843/products/2020_04_540x.jpg?v=1581608516 3rd partyimages2001.00 s42.1 KB
https://sb.scorecardresearch.com/p?c1=2&c2=6035310&c4=&cv=3.9&cj=1 3rd partyimages200984 ms43 B
https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtag/js?id=AW-608454122&ver=6.9.10 3rd partyjavascript200983 ms159.7 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/themes/vip/pmc-billboard-2021/assets/public/lazyload-fallback.gifimages200981 ms1,019.6 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/01-taylor-swift-tloas-encore-billboard-1800.jpg?w=705&h=470&crop=1images200981 ms47.4 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-adm-v2/build/atlas-setup-ads.js?ver=5cb2401b890aa1d60c20javascript200980 ms9.5 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-getemails/build/index.js?ver=f2f19a52403be86f9fabjavascript200980 ms607 B
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-trackonomics/build/index.js?ver=274abea90c74fe3f8539javascript200980 ms379 B
https://www.billboard.com/wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery.min.js?ver=3.7.1javascript200979 ms30.7 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-video-player/build/js/pmc-jwplayer.js?ver=f2efcd4bf2636f21dc3cjavascript200979 ms7.2 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-first-party-data/build/index.js?ver=23049b6feac2237e2c3bjavascript200979 ms1.2 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-onetrust/assets/build/helpers.js?ver=d51ed1d7adfe670fb8ebjavascript200979 ms1.1 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-first-party-cookie/build/index.js?ver=77ae06ef1bce0319c341javascript200979 ms1.0 KB
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-piano/assets/build/consent.js?ver=c27d8fa59e7d026610b1javascript200979 ms967 B
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-global-functions/js/pmc-ajax.min.js?ver=1790702372javascript200979 ms535 B
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-global-functions/js/pmc-hooks.min.js?ver=6.9.10javascript200979 ms366 B
https://www.billboard.com/wp-content/plugins/pmc-plugins/pmc-comscore/js/pmc-comscore.min.js?ver=1.2javascript200979 ms233 B
Report this page

The page is removed when the owner agrees. Sending this removes nothing by itself.

Run this test on your own site

The same engine, free, with the screenshots and the fixes. No account needed.