Advanced Minify Settings Of W3 Total Cache Plugin
October 30th, 2014 | by Ravi Chahar || 42 Comments |
In the previous article, I have written about general settings of W3 total cache plugin which should be used by bloggers. There are many settings of this amazing plugin and you must know.
You should know advanced minify settings of W3 Total cache because most of the bloggers do it wrong and face problems with their website. As I have discussed earlier that if you do wrong minify settings of this plugin then it may break CSS of your website and even it can conflict with other plugins too.
If you want to use this plugin effectively then you should know about the best minify settings. In general, settings you have selected “auto” option for minifying the settings but do you know about its advanced settings?
Minify settings of W3 Total Cache :
For better performance, you should do the best minify settings of W3 Total Cache. Many bloggers may think that why am I focusing on these settings of this plugins? I must let you know that these settings are so crucial and you should know about them otherwise, you may fall into trouble. It’s better to know them so that you wouldn’t face any difficulty in future. I am going to show you the correct settings with some steps.
Step 1). First, you need to open “Minify” by going to “performance corner in the dashboard of your WordPress. You can find this option easily at which you have to click. After clicking to “Minify” a new tab will open in front of you where you will find many settings from which you need to choose the best.
Step 2). You can see that first setting is “General” in which you can see some options. You should enable “Rewrite URL Structure”. It will help your users to get optimized results for their query. It’s a good practice to rewrite URL structure for embedded CSS and JS.
Another option is to “Disable minify for logged in users” by enabling which the logged in users will not get any minified page. But it’s better to keep the nature of your website same for all users.
Last option in this phase is to get a notification whenever your website gets any minification error. No need to enable it so select “Disabled” from the list.
Step 3). Here you come at “HTML & XML” settings. These settings are very important and you must keep an eye upon these. For better minification of your CSS and JavaScript files, you should “enable” it. Check to inline minification for CSS and JS which will ignore extra codes from the CSS and JS of your website. You should check on “Don’t minify feeds” because there is no need to minify your feeds. Only last option should be unchecked.
It is recommended that if you face any problem with the appearance of your website or any CSS error then you should disable this setting. Uncheck inline CSS & JS minification. I would recommend you to keep this setting disabled to have less risk.
There is another section to choose minification for the comments you get on your website. When minification is done then all the codes are removed to decrease page size but you should keep the comments from Google AdSense which is already written default. You can use any additional comments which you don’t want to get minified.
Step 4). Now it’s time to enable the JavaScript minify settings. Here you should click on “Enable”. Under “Operations in areas” you must use “Minify” with Default(blocking). Enable both the remaining option.
Note :- You must test this setting at your website and if you notice any visual change then disable it.
Step 5). In CSS minify settings you should check all the three options except “Combine only”. In “@import [get_bloginfo]url[/get_bloginfo]/files/handling” you must choose “process” from none, bubble, and process.
Note :- CSS id responsible for the design of your website and if you see any change in the design of your website then you shouldn’t use these settings.
Step 6). The last section is of advanced minify settings of W3 Total Cache. In this section, you shouldn’t click on the first option. Check it if you get any error related to the working of “Auto” option of minify. You can use manual option to remove such errors.
- Filename length = 150
- Update external files every = 21600
- Garbage collection interval = 86400
- Never minify the following = You can add particular pages you don’t want to get minified.
- Never minify the following JS files = Here too you can add files which you want to get ignored.
- Never minify the following CSS files = You have the option to add CSS files too.
- Reject user agents = Leave it blank.
- Include external files/libaries = Keep it default.
After doing setting for each section you should save settings. Keep in your mind that you may try these settings to reduce the page size of your website but most of the settings may harm the appearance of your website so it’s better to test them before permanent settings.
You can use CloudFlare with W3 Total cache plugin which can give better response in which you don’t need to do these settings.
Have you done minify settings of W3 Total cache properly?
Now have you become aware of the best minify settings of this amazing W3 Total cache? Are you ready to check this plugin with the minify settings?
It is dependent on the nature of your website and web hosting as how these settings would work? You have to do these settings with care and keep in your mind that after doing one setting you should check your website. If you see any visual change then it’s good to disable that setting.
Most of the settings are related to CSS and JavaScript so it’s better to check the design of your website every time to check minification for them.
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42 comments
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Hi Ravi
This tutorial was great and I am sure every blogger will be happy reading this post. As difficult as it seems to configure W3TC, I love the fact that you created a tutorial for advanced settings. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Ikechi,
You know most of bloggers face problem due to wrong minify settings so its important to know about these settings. Many bloggers will love this tutorial and there should do these settings for W3 Total cache plugin to get some effective results.
Thanks for your input.
Have a great week ahead.:)
~Ravi
HI Ravi,
In the part one of this tutorial, I made it clear that I wasn’t using wordpress blogging platform, so I don’t really know much about that.
All the same, thanks for sharing, hope it would be beneficial to wordpress users.
Hi Larry,
When you will switch to WordPress at that time you will need these type of tutorials to build your blog effectively. Website speed mattes a lot and using any caching plugin will help you in that. W3TC is one of the best caching plugin in WordPress directory and its necessary to know about its settings properly so that you can get more output from this plugin.
Thanks for stopping by.
Have a great day.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
This is going to be very helpful to bloggers who want to fine tune the decrease of their website load times. I am glad you mentioned that sometimes the minify settings can cause some loading and other css type issues with the blog. I think that it also depends on the theme that a blogger is using and plugins that they have. And I agree that it is a good idea to test things out before making the settings permanent. Sound advise! And I really like your tutorials!
Thanks,
Harish
Hi Harish,
This plugin is wonderful in its use but sometime it conflict with other plugins so its better to test it better activation. It may effect the CSS and JS of your website so you need to keep an eye at the design of your website while changing any setting. If you find any expected change in your website then you should disable that particular setting. In most of cases you need to look the design of your website because it is noted that W3TC settings may effect some CSS and JS files by reducing unnecessary codes from them.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us.
Enjoy your weekend.:)
~Ravi
Hello Ravi,
It is a nice tutorial and frankly speaking I really don’t know about that. But I do have a question will that be a problem if I use the above procedure with CDN ?
Have a nice day !!
Hi Rohit,
You know there are many settings of W3 Total Cache plugin. You can use CDN with it in which most of settings would be same but still there are some changes you have to do. While using CDN you have to do minify settings according to that only. And other settings should be done with that only. Though it is experienced that W3TC with free cloudflare is also good in its response.
Thanks for taking time to visit.
Have a nice weekend.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
The minify settings are definitely the most important aspect of a caching plugin. It can improve a site’s load times drastically but even cause havoc instantly, if minify is not set right. So, its good that you took up this topic and explained it in detail.
I’ve personally experienced many problems on Aha!NOW due to incorrect minify settings and learned the right way through trial and error.
I’ve enabled the minify error notification so that I get to know if there’s any problem in minification. Under HTML & XML settings, I also have checked the line break removal option and everything runs smooth.
In the JS minify settings, I’ve the embed type as non-blocking using “async” and under JS file management, I’ve specified the JS files that are shown as render-blocking by Google PageSpeed.
Under the CSS settings, I had none @import handling, but now made it process after your suggestion. Again, under CSS file management, I’ve mentioned the CSS render-blocking files.
I increased the garbage collection interval as per your suggestion. Sometimes, you do have certain pages or files that you do not want to minify, like the registration page or JS files of nrelate plugin or others.
Overall, I agree with you that the user needs to go with the personal experiences and observations of the site and adopt what suits the site after experimentation. It’s also good to take the feedback of the site visitors because somethings that work at your end might not work at other places.
If anything goes wrong, the minify option can be disabled, and the minify cache can also be manually emptied too. I do have CloudFlare, but I use the minify options of W3TC.
There’s always scope for learning in blogging and site management and I thank you for bringing some new facts to light.
Hi Vinay,
No doubt that this plugin is great in its work but only if you use right settings. Most of bloggers do wrong minify settings due to which they get into trouble. They should know about perfect settings of this plugin so that it would be great for them to have better speed of their website.
As I have mentioned above that its the matter of choice as if you want to enable error notification or not. Many bloggers don’t like to get notification again and again but somehow it helps to check the status of this plugin.
While in JS settings there is not any proper settings because the settings get changed with the nature of Web Hosting. If you have VPS hosting then you have to use different settings which you use with shared Web Hosting.
Minify settings are crucial and bloggers should know about them so that they don’t face any problem with their website speed.
Thanks for dropping your informative input.
Have an awesome weekend.:)
~Ravi
Hello Ravi,
Well to be honest I haven’t used w3 total cache plugin for any of my blog and I guess this might be the reason I don’t know about these settings.
I’ll be trying it soon.
Thanks
Hey Samir,
When you will use this plugin you have in need to do these settings. This is an amazing plugin to use for having better website speed. It will reduce page size of your website and improve its speed. Knowing about advanced minify settings is very important because they directly effect the CSS and JavaScript files of your website.
Thanks for stopping by.
Have an awesome weekend.:)
~Ravi
Hello Again Ravi,
Once again you have done an Awesome job here with this tutorial on the advanced minify settings, I am still curious about my first question though and will be back to see what your answer will be..
Thanks for sharing.. Chery :))
Hi Chery,
As I have answered your question at the previous article you must know how to use this caching plugin effectively? There are many settings you need to do and minify settings are somehow great but doing these wrong may conflict with other plugins. It may mismatch your website design if you don’t do these settings correctly. It is dependent of the behavior of your theme and other plugins. You should test this plugin before applying all the settings.
Thanks for taking time to drop your input.
Have a rocking day.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
Your posts are always details, I have no clue how the plugin works or really how it going to benefit my site except that it will speed up my site. I realise I need to go read you previous blog, which I have obviously missed, then get myself up to speed and educate myself on your minify plugin.
Will be back with questions no doubt
Thanks Ravi..love the detail and appreciate you and your detailed blogs
Di
Hi Di,
We all know that website speed matters lot and you need to use any caching plugin which can help you to increase it. You will find general settings in the previous article and now its time to know about some more advanced settings. Minify settings are important to know because these may create problem if you do it wrong.
Thanks for your input.
Hope to see you soon.:)
~Ravi
Hey Ravi,
Great tutorial as usual.
I read the first part of the tutorial : Have You Done The Best W3 Total Cache Settings To Speed Up Your Blog?
I enjoyed it.
You are here again with another advance guide of W3 total cache.
I bet it, this is going to be a huge time saver for other bloggers and internet entrepreneurs who are looking into speeding up their websites in order to achieve good load time.
Thank for updating us with this guide.
Take care and have a nice day ahead.
-Oloyede Jamiu
Hi Oloyede,
In the previous post it was all about the general settings of this plugin which can be used by beginners. But as you there are many people who used to face problems in doing advanced settings so you need to know about them in correct way.
Here are some great settings of this plugin with which you can reduce the page size and speed of your website increases.
Thanks for comment.
Enjoy your weekend.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
I don’t use W3, but I like your suggestions about testing performance after each settings modification.
I’ve found that with any plugin, it you set a bunch of things (or re-set), and then find incompatibilities with your theme or other plugins, it’s almost impossible to figure out. Then you tend to simply get rid of the plugin because it is “incompatible.”
In fact, it may not be incompatible at all, but some of your settings may result in adverse performance with other plugins. So, you need to drill deeper. Your advice to test one setting at a time is excellent. Thanks for that.
Hi Donna,
In the case of W3 total cache you must check your website after doing each and every website because it may harm your website design. Many bloggers have experienced that with the use of this plugin they have many problem with their other plugins. This is all because they don’t use the correct settings. For better use of this plugin you should use the right settings.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Enjoy your day.:)
~Ravi
The correct settings needs to be done for W3 Cache Plugin, otherwise it can not work properly. You can have explained very thoroughly the very important settings of Minify.
Great Work Ravi.
Hey Mustajaa,
For sure you need to do perfect settings to use this plugin in a proper way.
Thanks for your input.
Enjoy your day.
~Ravi
Ravi,
Thanks for the post. I don’t use W3 total cache but I liked the advice. It would helpful when I do use. As of now I have used only Super cache plugin and it worked well.
Hey Atish,
I am glad to know that you have found this article useful.
Website speed is very important and you should take care of it. For better results you can use this plugin.
Thanks for stopping by.
Have a nice day.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
You have a great tutorial here. I do not use W3 . I am not a technical person and have someone who does that side of it for me. I can do basic things but the reality is I do not enjoy it.
I so admire people like you who not only do and understand the tech side but can teach it as well. Thank you.
Sue
Hi Sue,
There are many things you need to know about this plugin. While using W3TC plugin you should know about these settings so that you can use it effectively at your blog. These basic things are very important to focus on.
Thanks for stopping by and for your admiration.
Have a great week ahead.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
Awesome post. Very informative. I am using this W3 Total cache in one of my new site. I was having some problem after installing the plugin.
The site appears normal in firefox and IE. However, in chrome it appeared as mobile site and in mobile it appeared as desktop version. I did some thing and it appeared mobile version on both PC and mobile devices.
I was searching for the correct settings and read your post. I followed the steps and fixed the issue.
Thank you very much for sharing this post ?
Umapathy
Hi Umapathy,
Sometimes it happens due to W3 total cache because of CSS minification. As I have recommended above that if you want to use any setting then first of all you should test it at your website to make it sure that it doesn’t harm your website design.
Minify settings of this plugin are crucial to know and you should do these settings carefully.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Enjoy your day.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
Its a nice tips on configuring the advanced part of the minify settings on w3 Total Cache Plugin.
Being an advanced wordpress user myself, I’ll greatly recommend this plugin to anyone that cares about the speed and response rate of their site.
You have done so well in providing this tutorial that completely demystify the act of configuring the cache plugin.
Thanks for the share and do have a splendid day.
Hey Obasi,
Website speed is very important for all and bloggers need to do many things for its improvement. With the use of W3 total cache plugin they can do it very easily. Its just they need to do right settings. Specially its very important to know about correct minify settings. I my previous post I have explained abut general settings of this plugin but then I thought to let other know about advanced minify settings which are crucial.
Thanks for stopping by.
Enjoy your day.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
Another wonderful post from your site as expected.
I always get confused how to set w3 total cache plugin. How it results go in my favor. I often finding a way to set this plugin. I didn’t know what setting suits this plugin.
This is a post what I was looking for. I’m using w3 total cache on my blog and this setting surely help me to get more advantage of this plugin.
Nice tutorial. Keep it up boy!
-Mustafa
Hi Mustafa,
There is nothing hard to do. You can do it very easily. Like you there are many people who try to use this plugin effectively but get afraid because of wrong settings. It is recommended that you should know about advanced minify settings because if you do these settings wrong then it may create problem with the design of your website. Hopefully this tutorial may help you to set this plugin for your blog.
Thanks for taking time to share your thoughts.
Enjoy your day ahead.:)
~Ravi
Hi, Ravi,
Even though I had the folks at Max CDN set up my W3 total cash plug-in for me, I will be sharing this article because I really believe it’s valuable to blog owners to know the correct way.
Thank you so much for providing this value and visuals as well because so many people are visual learners.
I hope you have a wonderful day, And I’ll talk to you soon.
– Carol
Hey Carol,
Settings of this plugin differ from website to website. Many bloggers have experienced that with the use of advanced minify settings they face problem with their website. As I have mentioned above that you should check your website after doing each and every settings so that you can come to know as if the settings works good with your website or not.
Thanks for taking time to put your input.
Have a nice week ahead.:)
~Ravi
Oh thanks Ravi, I never understood what these even meant. I’ve still hung onto your other post because as soon as I have time to look into this I’m going to check my settings to see if I have everything done right. I don’t think I do from the last time my hosting company made me deactivate it.
That’s why I appreciate these posts so much, you’re the man.
~Adrienne
Hi Adrienne,
Advanced minify settings are dependent on the type of web hosting you have. There are many changes in these settings for VPS hosting. And the most important thing is that you need to check them at your blog before allowing this plugin. Many hosting providers don’t prefer this plugin because it may create problem with their own super cache. But still you should know these minify settings.
Thanks for stopping by and sharing your thoughts.
Have a nice week ahead.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi,
Wonderful tutorial again. You have shared very deep tutorial about W3 total cache plugin.
Even, I never go in such deep settings with this plugin. Thank you for explaining each and every steps clearly here. I did these changes along with reading this post.
Thanks again for sharing with us. Really it was very helpful.
Have a nice day ahead!
Hi Nisha,
While using W3TC many bloggers do mistakes. Using perfect settings is the best thing to do because if you don’t do it then it may ruin your website instead of increasing its speed. Minify settings are necessary to use if you want to boost up your website speed.
Thanks for taking time to say your words.
Enjoy your day.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi
Thanks a lot for sharing a very helpful followup of your previous post. While reading that post I was just thinking why did you not mention advance minify settings in it.
You did right to publish a separate post on it. I also experienced a lot of problem while fully optimizing this plugin at one of my clients’ blog and made it work after facing lot of errors initially.
I am sure this post will help all those to fully optimize W3Total in first go without having any problem.
Thanks for sharing this very useful and easy to understand post.
Hey Muba,
In my last post I have explained the basic settings so that bloggers can learn something about using W3TC. But how could I forget about minify settings? So I had decided to write a separate post about advanced minify settings so that bloggers can come to know about these settings in a proper way. Many bloggers face problem with their website due to wrong minify settings and they are in need to know perfect setings.
Thanks for your input.
Enjoy your rest of the week.:)
~Ravi
Hi Ravi sir,
First of all thank you for sharing such an useful article. I have been using w3Total cache for my blog ever since I made my blog. I have gone through with many article on “How to setup w3Total cache” but however, I always ignored minify settings which today from this medium, I came to know that how crucial it is for enhancing blog speed.
Thank you for sharing this tutorial.
Regards,
Mohit
Hello Mohit,
I am happy to hear that I could help you with the settings of W3 total cache.
You will find many cache plugins in the market. There are many free plugins and many are premium. You should know that speed of your website matters a lot. Enabling a caching plugin enhances blog’s speed and for better results its necessary that you should proper settings of the plugin.
Thanks for your comment.
Have a nice day.
~Ravi