Below is a battle-tested PrestaShop speed optimization checklist, fully compatible with PrestaShop 9, Core Web Vitals, and real hosting environments.
(This complements your SEO work and directly impacts rankings and conversions.)

⚡ PrestaShop Speed Optimization Checklist (PS 9)

🧱 1. Hosting & Server (FOUNDATION)

✔ PHP 8.2 / 8.3 (mandatory for PS9)
✔ OPcache enabled (huge boost)
✔ Memory limit ≥ 512MB
✔ SSD / NVMe storage
✔ HTTP/2 or HTTP/3 enabled
✔ GZIP or Brotli compression ON

👉 If hosting is weak, nothing else helps.

🧠 2. PHP & MySQL Optimization

✔ Enable OPcache

opcache.enable=1
opcache.memory_consumption=256
opcache.max_accelerated_files=20000

✔ MySQL / MariaDB:

• innodb_buffer_pool_size = 60–70% RAM
• Use InnoDB only
• Disable query cache (obsolete)

✔ Use Redis for:

• Sessions
• Cache

⚙️ 3. PrestaShop Performance Settings

Back Office → Advanced Parameters → Performance

✔ Disable debug mode
✔ Smart cache for CSS → ON
✔ Smart cache for JS → ON
✔ Minify CSS / JS → ON
✔ Load JS deferred → ON
✔ Move JS to bottom → ON
✔ Disable non-used features:

• Combinations (if not used)
• Customer groups
• Multistore (if unused)

🧩 4. Theme Optimization (CRITICAL)

✔ PS9-compatible theme only
✔ Remove unused:

• CSS files
• JS libraries
• Fonts
• Icon packs

✔ Replace sliders with static hero images
✔ Avoid page builders (Elementor-style)

👉 Theme bloat is the #1 speed killer

🖼 5. Image Optimization (PS9 Advantage)

✔ Enable WebP + AVIF
✔ Correct image sizes per device
✔ Lazy loading enabled
✔ Compress existing images
✔ Avoid PNG unless transparent

Target:

• Product image < 150 KB
• Banner < 300 KB

🌍 6. CDN & Caching Layer

✔ Cloudflare (recommended)

• Cache static assets
• Enable Brotli
• Image optimization
• Early Hints

✔ Page cache:

• LiteSpeed Cache (if available)
• Nginx FastCGI Cache

✔ Exclude:

• Cart
• Checkout
• My Account

📦 7. Module Audit (HUGE IMPACT)

✔ Remove unused modules
✔ Disable heavy modules:

• Live chat
• Popups
• Tracking duplicates

✔ Replace modules that:

• Load JS/CSS globally
• Inject inline JS

✔ Keep module count < 50

🧬 8. Database Optimization

✔ Remove:

• Old carts
• Old connections
• Logs
• Stats tables

✔ Optimize tables monthly
✔ Disable stats modules in production

📊 9. Core Web Vitals Targets

✔ Preload hero image
✔ Preload fonts
✔ Reduce JS execution time

🤖 10. Third-Party Scripts Control

✔ Load:

• Analytics after consent
• Chat widgets deferred

✔ Remove:

• Duplicate trackers
• Old pixels

✔ Use GTM efficiently (no junk tags)

🧪 11. Testing Tools (Use ALL)

✔ Google PageSpeed Insights
✔ Lighthouse
✔ GTmetrix
✔ WebPageTest
✔ Chrome DevTools → Coverage

❌ Common Speed Killers (Avoid These)

❌ Cheap shared hosting
❌ Heavy multipurpose themes
❌ Too many marketing modules
❌ PNG banners
❌ No CDN

🏁 Final Optimization Order (IMPORTANT)

1️⃣ Hosting
2️⃣ Caching
3️⃣ Theme cleanup
4️⃣ Image optimization
5️⃣ Module cleanup
6️⃣ Database cleanup