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Tools

The tools we genuinely use to measure performance, optimise images, check SEO, and build websites — with notes on when each one is worth reaching for.

Every link on this page goes to a third-party site and opens in a new tab. No affiliate links.

Measure Performance

Before fixing speed, measure it. These are the four we open every time we audit a site.

The Core Web Vitals guide
  • Lab data plus real-user field data (CrUX). Always check the mobile tab first.

    pagespeed.web.dev
  • WebPageTest

    Freemium

    Test from a specific location and connection speed — useful for testing from Jakarta or Singapore.

    webpagetest.org
  • Mandatory on every site. Watch indexing, queries, and the Core Web Vitals report.

    search.google.com
  • Already in your browser. Run it against a production build, not a dev server.

    developer.chrome.com

Image Optimisation

Images are usually 60–70% of page weight. This is the fastest place to win.

  • Compress and convert to WebP/AVIF in the browser. Nothing is uploaded to a server.

    squoosh.app
  • Strips editor metadata out of SVG files. Often halves the size of a logo.

    jakearchibald.github.io
  • Sharp

    Free

    For batch conversion inside a build pipeline rather than one file at a time.

    sharp.pixelplumbing.com

SEO & Structured Data

You can check technical SEO foundations yourself. These are what we verify with.

The first business website guide
  • Checks whether your Schema.org structured data is readable by Google.

    search.google.com
  • The reference for structured data types — Article, Product, LocalBusiness, and the rest.

    schema.org
  • For a business with a physical location, this often matters more than on-page SEO.

    business.google.com

Build & Hosting

The stack we use to build and ship sites to production.

Our daily stack
  • Astro

    Free

    Framework for content-driven sites. Pages ship as HTML, JavaScript only where needed.

    astro.build
  • For web applications with a database, authentication, and background work.

    laravel.com
  • Utility-first styling. Only the classes you actually use get shipped.

    tailwindcss.com
  • Cloudflare

    Freemium

    DNS, CDN, and SSL. Almost always worth putting in front of any hosting.

    cloudflare.com
  • React framework with server-side rendering. The right pick when the project genuinely needs the deeper React ecosystem.

    nextjs.org
  • Payload CMS

    Freemium

    TypeScript-first headless CMS. Editorial teams get an admin panel; developers get REST + GraphQL out of the box.

    payloadcms.com

Analytics & Uptime

You can't fix what you don't measure — or downtime you never hear about.

  • The industry standard. Needs a cookie consent banner in many jurisdictions.

    analytics.google.com
  • A lightweight, cookie-free alternative. The script is far smaller than GA.

    plausible.io
  • UptimeRobot

    Freemium

    Tells you the site is down before a customer does.

    uptimerobot.com

Don't have time to run these yourself?

We run performance and technical SEO audits as part of every project — and as standalone work for sites already live.

Get notified when we publish

No spam. Just new articles and project notes, a couple of times a month.