On June 2nd, Google announced on their small business blog that they will be introducing a new tool that allows web admins to check how mobile-friendly their sites are, in addition to desktop speed and mobile speed. While other services exist on the internet, including on Google Webmaster Tools, Google itself has never launched an application that was designed to appeal to web users of such a varying range of technical knowledge.
The “Test My Site” feature merely requires users to enter the URL in order for Google to calculate how quick and mobile-friendly the site is. Upon entering in the URL, the feature then determines how mobile-friendly the site is out of 100.
Some of the factors Google uses to determine how mobile-friendly a site is, includes:
- Font legibility
- The size of the content on mobile
- Whether plug-ins are interfering with the site’s mobile responsiveness
- Whether buttons are appropriately sized for mobile users (ie: buttons are clickable without needing to zoom-in)
Test My Site also displays how quick sites are on both mobile and desktops by also using a 100-point scale for each. Factors that may be slowing down a site, include overuse of javascript, under-optimization of images and underuse of caching.
The importance of optimizing your site for mobile is paramount in 2016, considering as recently as last month, Google added mobile-friendliness as one of its ranking factors. Therefore, the introduction of the Test My Site tool is fitting, as web creators of all knowledge levels now have the ability to understand why their site could be hurting in rankings due to their site’s mobile responsiveness.