In the rapidly evolving digital landscape, maintaining a high-quality website is essential for attracting and retaining users.

Google’s Lighthouse is an invaluable tool designed to help web developers and SEO professionals audit and improve various aspects of a website's performance. As an open-source tool, Lighthouse provides detailed insights into key areas such as performance, accessibility, SEO, and best practices, making it easier to identify and rectify issues that could hinder your site’s success.

What is Lighthouse?

Lighthouse was developed by Google to offer a comprehensive evaluation of a website’s performance. It is an automated tool that runs audits on web pages, providing developers with actionable feedback to enhance their site’s quality. Among the different categories that Lighthouse audits, "Best Practices" stands out as a critical area that focuses on the security, reliability, and user experience of a website.

The Concept of Best Practices in Web Development

In web development, "Best Practices" refers to a set of guidelines and standards that ensure websites are built in a secure, efficient, and user-friendly manner. These practices include using HTTPS for secure communication, keeping JavaScript libraries and frameworks up-to-date, avoiding deprecated APIs, and ensuring mobile responsiveness. Lighthouse evaluates a website against these best practices, providing a score that reflects how well the site adheres to modern web standards.

Why are Lighthouse Best Practices Important?

Adhering to best practices is crucial for several reasons. Firstly, it ensures that your website is secure, reducing the risk of vulnerabilities that could lead to security breaches. A secure website not only protects user data but also builds trust with your audience, which is essential for maintaining a loyal user base.

Secondly, following best practices enhances the reliability of your website. This means your site will perform consistently well across different devices and browsers, providing a seamless user experience.

Finally, a high score in Lighthouse Best Practices positively impacts your website’s overall quality, including its SEO performance. Google favours websites that adhere to best practices, which can lead to better search engine rankings. Moreover, a well-maintained website that follows best practices is more likely to attract and retain users, contributing to long-term success.

In summary, achieving a high score in Lighthouse Best Practices is not just about meeting technical standards; it's about ensuring your website is secure, reliable, and provides a superior user experience.

What are Lighthouse Best Practices?

Understanding Lighthouse Best Practices

The "Best Practices" category in Lighthouse audits is designed to evaluate how well your website adheres to modern web development standards and practices. This category focuses on ensuring that your website is not only functional but also secure, efficient, and user-friendly. The audit identifies potential issues that could compromise your website’s security, performance, or user experience, and provides actionable recommendations to address these problems.

Lighthouse checks for a variety of issues under Best Practices, including the use of HTTPS for secure communication, the implementation of secure and up-to-date JavaScript libraries, and the correct use of APIs. It also assesses whether your site is following best practices for mobile responsiveness, including appropriate viewport settings and touch targets. The goal is to help developers ensure that their websites are robust, secure, and aligned with industry standards.

Scoring highly in the Best Practices audit is crucial because it reflects your commitment to maintaining a high-quality website. A strong score not only helps protect your site from security vulnerabilities but also enhances user trust and satisfaction. Adhering to these best practices is essential for staying competitive in the ever-evolving digital landscape.

Key Areas Assessed in Lighthouse Best Practices

Security-Related Practices

One of the primary concerns of Lighthouse Best Practices is security. Using HTTPS is essential for protecting data transmitted between your website and its users, ensuring that all communications are encrypted and secure. Additionally, keeping JavaScript libraries and other dependencies up-to-date is vital to protect your site from vulnerabilities that could be exploited by attackers.

Web Application Integrity

Lighthouse also evaluates the integrity of your web application. This includes the correct use of web technologies such as Service Workers and Web Manifests, which are crucial for creating reliable and performant web applications. Avoiding common vulnerabilities, such as mixed content (where secure and insecure content are loaded on the same page) and insecure cross-origin requests, is critical for maintaining the security and reliability of your site.

Mobile Responsiveness and User Experience

In today’s mobile-first world, ensuring that your website is fully responsive is more important than ever. Lighthouse Best Practices assesses your site’s adherence to mobile-friendly design principles, including the use of appropriate viewport settings, touch targets, and responsive images. These factors are essential for providing a seamless and enjoyable experience for users on all devices.

Performance and Efficiency

Finally, the Best Practices audit looks at the performance and efficiency of your site. This includes ensuring that key resources are preloaded to improve loading times and avoiding deprecated APIs that could slow down your site or introduce potential errors. Following modern coding standards and optimising performance are critical for delivering a fast and reliable user experience.

By addressing these key areas, you can significantly improve your Lighthouse Best Practices score, ensuring that your website is secure, efficient, and aligned with modern web development standards.

How to Improve Your Lighthouse Best Practices Score to 100

Ensure HTTPS Everywhere

Serving your entire website over HTTPS is crucial for both security and user trust. HTTPS encrypts the data exchanged between your website and its users, protecting sensitive information from potential interception. To implement HTTPS, you must first obtain an SSL certificate from a trusted Certificate Authority (CA). Once acquired, install the certificate on your server and configure it correctly. It’s also essential to enforce HTTPS across your site by setting up redirects from HTTP to HTTPS, ensuring that all pages and resources are served securely. Regularly check your website to make sure there are no mixed content issues, which occur when secure pages load insecure resources.

Use Up-to-Date Libraries and Frameworks

Regularly updating your JavaScript libraries and frameworks is vital for maintaining a secure and stable website. Outdated libraries can have vulnerabilities that may be exploited by attackers. To avoid this, use tools like npm (Node Package Manager) or Yarn to manage your dependencies and keep them up to date. These tools can automatically notify you when new versions are available and help you update your codebase with minimal disruption. Regularly reviewing and updating your libraries ensures your site remains secure and performs optimally.

Avoid Vulnerable and Deprecated APIs

Using deprecated or vulnerable APIs can expose your website to security risks and potential malfunctions. It’s important to identify any deprecated APIs in your codebase and replace them with secure, modern alternatives. Tools like Lighthouse and security-focused linters can help you detect such issues. Additionally, stay informed about the latest best practices in API usage to ensure that your web development is up-to-date and secure.

Implement Secure Web Practices

Configuring a robust Content Security Policy (CSP) is essential for preventing various types of attacks, such as cross-site scripting (XSS). A CSP allows you to control which resources are allowed to load on your website, blocking any that do not comply with your security policy. Additionally, ensure that all resources—such as images, scripts, and stylesheets—are loaded securely via HTTPS to avoid mixed content issues. This not only enhances security but also contributes positively to your Lighthouse Best Practices score.

Optimise for Mobile and Touch Devices

In today’s mobile-first world, ensuring that your website is optimised for mobile and touch devices is critical. This includes following best practices for touch targets, such as making them large enough to be easily tapped and ensuring they are spaced adequately. Implementing responsive design techniques ensures that your site functions smoothly across all device types and screen sizes. Testing your site on various devices helps identify and rectify any usability issues, leading to a better user experience and improved Lighthouse scores.

Follow Modern Coding Standards

Adhering to modern coding standards is essential for maintaining a high-quality website. This involves using the latest web development guidelines, which help ensure your code is efficient, secure, and compatible with current technologies. Regularly validate your code using tools like W3C's Markup Validation Service to catch and correct errors early. Following these standards not only enhances your website’s performance but also ensures long-term maintainability and scalability.

The Benefits of Achieving a 100 Lighthouse Best Practices Score

Enhanced Security and User Trust

Adhering to Lighthouse Best Practices significantly improves your website’s security by ensuring that you are following the most up-to-date and secure coding standards. This reduces the likelihood of security vulnerabilities that could lead to breaches or other malicious activities. By implementing best practices such as using HTTPS, securing your JavaScript libraries, and avoiding deprecated APIs, you demonstrate a commitment to protecting user data. This, in turn, builds user trust, as visitors are more likely to engage with and return to a website they perceive as secure and reliable.

Improved SEO and Search Engine Rankings

Google’s search algorithms increasingly favour websites that adhere to modern web standards, including those outlined in Lighthouse’s Best Practices. By scoring highly in this audit, your website is more likely to rank better in search engine results. A well-maintained, secure website not only pleases users but also search engines, leading to improved visibility. This is especially important as search engines continue to refine their algorithms to prioritise user experience and security.

Better User Experience and Engagement

Websites that follow best practices offer a more reliable, faster, and user-friendly experience. These improvements lead to greater user satisfaction, which is reflected in metrics such as longer session durations and lower bounce rates. When a website is well-optimised, users can navigate more easily, experience fewer errors, and enjoy faster load times, all of which contribute to a positive user experience and increased engagement.

Long-Term Maintenance and Scalability

Maintaining and scaling a website that adheres to best practices is significantly easier and more cost-effective. By following established standards, you future-proof your website, making it simpler to integrate new technologies, apply updates, and ensure continued compatibility with evolving web standards. This not only saves time and resources but also ensures your website remains competitive and relevant in the long term.

Take Action with Softforge

Your website’s security, performance, and user experience are critical to its success. Achieving a perfect 100 Lighthouse Best Practices score is more than just a benchmark—it’s a commitment to excellence that can set your site apart from the competition. By ensuring that your website adheres to the latest best practices, you protect your users, improve your SEO, and enhance overall engagement.

However, maintaining and improving your site’s best practices can be complex and time-consuming. This is where Softforge can help. We specialise in auditing, optimising, and future-proofing websites to meet the highest standards set by Lighthouse. Our team of experts will work with you to identify areas for improvement, implement necessary updates, and ensure your website remains secure, efficient, and user-friendly.

Don’t leave your website’s success to chance. Contact Softforge today to start your journey towards a perfect Lighthouse Best Practices score. With our professional services, you can rest assured that your website will not only meet but exceed modern web standards, giving you a competitive edge in the digital landscape. Let us help you achieve the excellence your website deserves.