Navigation Types
Navigation Types reveal how users access a webpage. They might type a URL directly, refresh a page, or return through browser history.
Understanding these navigation types is essential because some are much swifter than others. From a web speed optimization standpoint, the aim is to transition as many users as possible to the faster navigation types.
How to Obtain Navigation Types?
Browsers house them within APIs like PerformanceNavigationTiming.type. Google collects this data from users in the Chrome UX Report (CrUX). You can access them for your site through the monitoring service PageSpeed.ONE PLUS.
Why Are Navigation Types Important?
There are several reasons to monitor Navigation Types:
- They help understand user behavior and optimize web pages for faster loading, thereby enhancing user experience, SEO, and other business aspects.
- They allow the identification of loading issues and analysis of how different navigation methods affect website performance.
- They assist in planning and implementing strategies for caching and pre-rendering, leading to improved web application performance.
Possible Values of Navigation Types
| Navigation Type | Description |
|---|---|
navigate | Direct page load by a user entering a URL or clicking a link. |
navigate_cache | Loading HTML document from the browser cache. |
reload | Page refresh by the user. |
restore | Page reloaded after a browser restart or memory-induced tab restart. |
back_forward | Moving back or forward in the browser's history. |
back_forward_cache | Loading from BFcache, which serves to instantly display pages from browsing history. |
prerender | Pre-loading a page for faster future display, e.g., using the Speculation Rules API. |
What Can Be Done with This?
Knowledge of Navigation Types enables you to optimize page display for instant navigation types:
- Implement BFCache: Allows rapid page loading when users navigate through history.
- HTML Caching: Efficient data storage and management for repeated loads. This also facilitates better caching across different CDNs.
- Pre-rendering: Pre-loading key pages, for example, using the Speculation Rules API.
Navigation Types in PageSpeed.ONE Monitoring
PageSpeed.ONE PLUS uses Navigation Types data to better understand user interactions and optimize sites for faster loading.
In monitoring, this allows you to track over time how different navigation types affect speed and user experience, enabling you to tailor your strategies to enhance your website.
Development of individual navigation types on Mall.cz.
As you can see in the image, fast navigation types often occur in just a few percent of pageviews on websites. Therefore, Navigation Types represent a significant and often readily accessible optimization opportunity.