The front-end side of news

Front-end metrics from big news sites around the world.

Website Country Last time checked Transferred page weight W3C validation Security Usage of heading elements Markup and implementation of site logo Usability without JavaScript
not cached in MB cached in KB Markup errors CSS errors SSL encryption Usage of security headers
Ø Ø Ø Ø
abc.net.au/news Australia May 19th 2016 0.58 45 10 43 F
afr.com Australia May 6th 2016 1.3 316 28 201 F
dailytelegraph.com.au Australia May 6th 2016 3.6 256 133 388 F
smh.com.au Australia May 6th 2016 2.4 112 150 254 F
theaustralian.com.au Australia May 6th 2016 1.9 224 196 47 F
derstandard.at Austria May 4th 2016 1.7 98 127 34 F
diepresse.com Austria May 4th 2016 2.1 135 77 4 F
heute.at Austria May 4th 2016 6.9 120 271 51 F
kleinezeitung.at Austria May 4th 2016 1.8 176 565 137 F
krone.at Austria May 4th 2016 2.8 339 10 20 F
kurier.at Austria May 4th 2016 1.8 52 90 67 F
nachrichten.at Austria May 4th 2016 1.3 59 461 17 F
oe24.at Austria May 4th 2016 7.3 632 68 41 F
orf.at Austria May 4th 2016 0.44 2 40 13 F
tt.com Austria May 4th 2016 3.5 420 135 77 F
20minutes.fr France May 6nd 2016 1.3 151 4 90 F
la-croix.com France May 2nd 2016 3.0 77 9 179 F
lequipe.fr France May 2nd 2016 1.4 129 556 79 F
lexpress.fr France May 2nd 2016 2.5 914 160 314 F
lefigaro.fr France May 2nd 2016 1.5 225 92 873 F
lemonde.fr France May 2nd 2016 2.3 147 151 41 F
lesechos.fr France May 2nd 2016 3.1 120 8 32 F
liberation.fr France May 2nd 2016 2.7 41 20 101 F
bild.de Germany May 19th 2016 3.4* 70* 3 35 F
chip.de Germany May 17th 2016 0.96 39 47 94 F
faz.net Germany April 28th 2016 2.4 40 545 32 F
focus.de Germany April 28th 2016 3.3 78 615 15 F
golem.de Germany April 28th 2016 1.0 66 121 28 F
handelsblatt.com Germany April 28th 2016 3.7 115 116 146 F
heise.de Germany April 28th 2016 2.6 30 46 59 F
heute.de Germany May 4th 2016 2.6 47 316 141 F
morgenweb.de Germany May 4th 2016 4.5 324 20 101 F
pnp.de Germany April 28th 2016 1.9 93 226 21 F
rp-online.de Germany April 28th 2016 1.5 15 115 40 F
spiegel.de Germany April 28th 2016 1.4 58 220 217 F
stern.de Germany April 28th 2016 4.6 82 11 181 F
sueddeutsche.de Germany April 28th 2016 2.4 62 251 42 F
t3n.de Germany April 28th 2016 1.5 72 130 106 F
tagesschau.de Germany May 4th 2016 1.7 45 8 59 F
welt.de Germany September 14th 2016 0.78 4 27 30 F
wiwo.de Germany April 28th 2016 4.9 184 111 91 F
zeit.de Germany April 28th 2016 1.4 136 7 89 F
corriere.it Italy May 4th 2016 1.7 107 71 194 F
gazzetta.it Italy May 19th 2016 2.1 117 163 2354 F
ilfattoquotidiano.it Italy May 4th 2016 3.0 83 513 19 F
ilgiornale.it Italy May 4th 2016 2.2 21 160 2 F
ilmattino.it Italy May 4th 2016 4.5 78 757 73 F
lastampa.it Italy May 4th 2016 1.4 78 305 106 F
repubblica.it Italy May 4th 2016 1.4 144 104 254 F
ad.nl Netherlands May 6th 2016 3.4 42 1 1 F
nos.nl Netherlands May 6th 2016 3.3 22 2 15 F
nrc.nl Netherlands May 6th 2016 0.71 34 162 555 F
nu.nl Netherlands May 6th 2016 1.1 69 27 290 F
telegraaf.nl Netherlands May 6th 2016 2.2 209 247 147 F
volkskrant.nl Netherlands May 6th 2016 1.5 42 56 73 F
bbc.com UK May 1st 2016 1.5 4 9 216 F
dailymail.co.uk UK May 1st 2016 8.0 74 274 369 F
ft.com UK May 1st 2016 3.2 139 6 27 E
independent.co.uk UK May 1st 2016 2.0 75 126 4 E
mirror.co.uk UK May 1st 2016 2.3 98 11 272 F
skynews.com UK May 17th 2016 1.0 37 48 1 F
telegraph.co.uk UK May 1st 2016 5.1 133 185 290 E
theguardian.com UK May 1st 2016 1.3 19 85 643 B
thesun.co.uk UK May 1st 2016 0.96 68 3 130 F
abcnews.com USA May 3rd 2016 2.1 117 165 210 F
arstechnica.com USA April 26th 2016 1.3 58 218 48 F
bostonglobe.com USA April 26th 2016 2.5 214 9 391 F
cnet.com USA April 26th 2016 3.1 33 146 124 F
cnn.com USA April 26th 2016 3.5 965 33 110 C
espn.com USA April 26th 2016 2.3 48 409 267 F
foxnews.com USA April 26th 2016 1.7 159 26 44 F
gizmodo.com USA April 26th 2016 3.5 74 253 67 D
huffingtonpost.com USA April 26th 2016 2.7 95 240 332 F
latimes.com USA April 26th 2016 0.62 26 215 83 F
nbcnews.com USA May 3rd 2016 1.8 96 10 61 F
nytimes.com USA April 26th 2016 2.0 138 26 47 E
recode.net USA April 26th 2016 1.7 100 26 176 F
techcrunch.com USA April 26th 2016 1.5 170 96 61 F
time.com USA April 26th 2016 3.1 85 66 69 F
usatoday.com USA April 26th 2016 2.7 24 88 245 F
vox.com USA April 26th 2016 1.9 224 9 166 B
washingtonpost.com USA April 26th 2016 1.8 50 170 115 E
wsj.com USA April 26th 2016 2.6 199 266 175 F
abc.es Spain May 19th 2016 1 690 12 48 F
elmundo.es Spain May 19th 2016 2.6 66 35 95 F
elpais.com Spain May 19th 2016 2 73 47 31 F
elperiodico.com Spain May 19th 2016 5.6 64 189 73 F
larazon.es Spain May 19th 2016 2.3 110 762 253 F
lavanguardia.com Spain May 19th 2016 1.9 62 22 221 F
publico.es Spain May 19th 2016 7.3 58 6 89 F
20min.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 4.4 200 222 28 F
24heures.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 6.6 300 401 163 F
bernerzeitung.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 6.0 330 354 180 F
blick.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 32.0 3 9 303 F
blickamabend.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 2.7 2 14 366 F
nzz.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 0.70 105 165 37 E
srf.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 1.5 1 21 417 F
tagblatt.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 2.2 63 135 123 F
tagesanzeiger.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 7.6 395 458 161 F
watson.ch Switzerland May 18th 2016 2.3 66 157 48 F

Legend and metrics

Transferred page weight

Metrics for not cached measurements:

Legend
less than 1 MB
between 1 and 1.49 MB
between 1.5 and 1.99 MB
between 2 and 2.99 MB
3 MB and more

Metrics for cached measurements:

Legend
less than 50 KB
between 50 and 99 KB
between 100 and 199 KB
between 200 and 299 KB
300 KB and more

“Transferred page weight” measures the total content transferred to the browser, which may be reduced due to compression. Measured on the home page with a 15 inch MacBook and

  • latest Chrome Canary in fullscreen mode
  • Chrome DevTools network tab
  • ad-blocking enabled (for more comparable results)
  • without scrolling (so things like lazy loading of images have the appropriate effect)

The not cached metric was measured as follows:

  • open Chrome DevTools and activate “Disable cache”
  • navigate to website
  • wait for at least 10 second after full loaded page before noting the result

The cached metric was measured as follows:

  • open Chrome DevTools and deactivate “Disable cache”
  • navigate to website
  • wait for at least 10 second after full loaded page
  • retype the URL of the website in the address bar and hit enter
  • wait for at least 10 second after full loaded page before noting the result

* = with ads enabled

W3C markup and CSS validation

Total amount of W3C markup and CSS validation errors using Markup Validation Service and CSS Validation Service.

Please note: As pointed out in this GitHub issue a valid website isn’t per se a well-crafted website. But I do think that developers should try to keep validation errors to an absolute minimum.

Legend
no errors
less than 50 errors
between 50 and 100 errors
more than 100 errors

SSL encryption

Legend
fully encrypted, no mixed unsecure content, automatic redirect to SSL version of page URL
encryption is theoretically available, mixed unsecure content, no automatic redirect to SSL version of page URL
no encryption whatsoever

Usage of security headers

Grades as defined by securityheaders.io:

Legend
A+
A or B
C or D
E or F

Markup and usage of headings

Legend
excellent usage of headings, order of heading levels makes sense
pretty good and consistent usage of headings, order of heading levels sometimes not optimal (e.g. h6 followed by h2), maybe tiny fraction of actual headings aren’t marked up as heading elements
overall good and frequent usage of headings, still some or many actual headings aren’t marked up as heading elements
(very) rare usage of headings, most actual headings aren’t marked up as such
no usage of heading elements whatsoever

Markup and implementation of site logo

Legend
image in markup, existing textual representation, schema.org markup
image in markup, existing textual representation, overall good implementation
CSS background image, existing textual representation, sometimes text hidden with CSS
no textual representation in the markup

Usability without JavaScript

Legend
almost no difference
most content visible and clickable, main navigation and search are usable, some images not visible but placeholder images exist
most content visible and clickable, sometimes main navigation and/or search not usable, some or all images underneath the fold not visible
no or only some images visible, main navigation and/or search not usable
most content not visible or usable, main navigation and search not usable