Background of the issue:
Our site feels slow. If we disable WPML, the site speed noticeably increases.
The main parameters:
200.000+ products,
hosted on a strong server,
PHP 8.1,
No active Query monitor or SSL redirection plugins.
Index WP MySQL For Speed plugin is active.
I have already walked through these recommendations: https://wpml.org/forums/topic/how-can-i-improve-performance-of-a-slow-site/ except for cache, because all cache solutions we tried so far made the site slower. (it is under development, we are continuously trying to make cache work). However, since the site is slower when WPML is active (and according to documentation, it should not be), I would like to know if your developers can detect any particular issue related to WPML.
Symptoms:
The site is slower when WPML is active.
Questions:
Can your developers detect any particular issue related to WPML that is causing the site to slow down?
Yes, we would be happy to take a closer look at this.
We would like to request temporary access (wp-admin and FTP) to your site to take a better look at the issue. You will find the needed fields for this below the comment area when you log in to leave your next reply. The information you will enter is private which means only you and us can see and have access to it.
Our Debugging Procedures
We will be checking various settings in the backend to see if the issue can be resolved. Although we won't be making changes that affect the live site, it is still good practice to backup the site before providing us access. In the event that we do need to debug the site further, we will duplicate the site and work in a separate, local development environment to avoid affecting the live site.
- Please make a backup of the site files and database before providing us access.
- If you do not see the wp-admin/FTP fields this means your post & website login details will be made PUBLIC. DO NOT post your website details unless you see the required wp-admin/FTP fields. If you do not, please ask me to enable the private box.
Is this a live site or a staging environment? If it is a live site, do you possibly have a staging environment where the performance issue is reproduced?
We can create one for you if needed but since there is a large number of products it would be good to test on an existing staging env.
I modified the access details in the private message for the test site. The test site is on the same server, but different directory (and of course different database). The test site does not have images.
There are many 404 errors due to the missing/broken images and icons which can be causing a performance hit on the staging site.
However, enabling WPML makes the site unusable at the moment. My load time was around 3-5 minutes... is this what you are also experiencing on your live site?
Not sure if the 404 errors are exaggerating these times.
Switching from the Child theme to Flatsome and activating WPML
backend load time 3s
front end load time 4.3s
These results point towards an issue between the Child Theme and WPML.
Are you currently using a lot of custom code/functions in your Child theme? Any new ones added recently that could have caused some compatibility issues?
Please do note that our support provides limited support when it comes to custom work, however, I will do what I can to help you resolve this issue.
If you developed the child theme I recommend to review the functions or custom code used or to contact your developer to also review this.
There are a lot of customizations on the site, but they are all in the "FS" plugin. In the child theme, there are no custom code.
However, I double checked the child theme's functions.php and found a snippet - related to WPML, which made the site unresponsible earlier as well. I'm not sure if it was left there by the previous supporter (it was a different issue: https://wpml.org/forums/topic/cannot-open-wpml-settings-page-fatal-error/) or by you, but now I commented it out, because this certainly "kills" the site.
So without this snippet, you can test the site with WPML enabled/disabled. Our expreience was that the site loads cc. 2 times slower with WPML enabled.
If you want to exclude all custom code (written by me, the developer of the site) you could disable "FS" plugin.
However if the No.1 "suspect" remains the child theme, then it must be some theme related setting, which causes the long loading times (3-4 seconds are not the best, but we would be ok with that, it's much better than 7s).
I added no script during this debugging session, therefore it must have been from the previous ticket, glad it has been deactivated now.
Reviewing the performance now with your parent theme and a minimal environment I am not seeing a major increase of performance with WPML enabled vs without.
Checking out the FTTB loading time I get an increase from 1.33 to 1.44
That is indeed not a big difference.
Would you be so kind to make a test with woocommerce and all Dokan plugins enabled? (Dokan + Dokan pro + Dokan WPML) Because these three plugins (Woo, Dokan, WPML) are the most important plugins of our site.
