Warm your cache for mobile visitors, from where they are
A classic cache warmer visits your site from one server, as one desktop browser. That warms exactly one copy of each page: the desktop copy, in the cache closest to that server. Most sites keep more copies than that. A phone often gets its own version of the page, and a CDN keeps a separate cache in every region it serves. Every copy nobody warmed is a cold page for the first real visitor who asks for it.
Mobile visitors get their own cache
Many sites serve phones a different page than laptops, and cache the two separately. Themes with a mobile layout, WordPress caching plugins with a separate mobile cache, Varnish setups that vary on device, and CDNs that split the cache by device type all do this. A crawl as a desktop browser leaves the mobile copy cold, while more than half of your visitors probably arrive on a phone.
Every project now has a Devices setting:
- Desktop: warms each page the way a desktop browser asks for it (the default).
- Mobile: warms each page as a smartphone browser.
- Desktop and mobile: warms both copies of every page.
With desktop and mobile, each page is visited twice, so it counts as two requests from your plan. The crawl results show a separate tab per device, so you can see which pages each device got.
Warm the cache where your visitors are
A CDN such as Cloudflare, Fastly or CloudFront keeps a separate cache in each region. When we warm your site from Ireland, the European edge is warm, but a visitor in New York or Hong Kong is served from a different edge that has never seen the page. That visitor waits for your origin server.
You can now pick one or more Locations per project:
Location | Region |
|---|---|
Europe (Ireland) | eu-west-1 |
US East (N. Virginia) | us-east-1 |
US West (N. California) | us-west-1 |
Asia Pacific (Sydney) | ap-southeast-2 |
Asia Pacific (Hong Kong) | ap-east-1 |
Each location runs its own crawl of your site, at the same scheduled time. Every location counts its own requests, so three locations use your requests three times as fast. The project form shows how much faster before you save. Multiple locations are part of the paid plans.
Setting it up
- Open your project in the dashboard and click Configure.
- Under Devices, pick desktop, mobile, or both.
- Under Locations, tick every region where you have visitors.
- Save. The next scheduled crawl warms every combination you picked.
Which combination fits:
Your site | Devices | Locations |
|---|---|---|
Local business, one country, same page on every device | Desktop | The one closest to you |
Separate mobile cache (theme, plugin or CDN setting) | Desktop and mobile | The one closest to you |
Visitors on several continents, behind a CDN | Desktop, or both | One per continent you serve |
No CDN, one server | Desktop, or both | The one closest to your server |
Without a CDN, extra locations add little: there is only one cache, on your server, and any location warms it.
Try it
Your first visitor shouldn't pay for a cold cache, whatever device they use and wherever they are. Devices and Locations are available in every project today. New to Cache Warmer? Start your free trial: enter your site's address and we warm your first pages right away.
