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Web Development · January 11, 2026 · 4 min read
Fast by default: a performance budget for small sites
Small sites should be fast without heroics. The budget I set before writing a line of code — and what gets cut first when it slips.
Performance is respect for visitors' time, data, and devices. For a marketing or booking site, I set the budget up front so trade-offs are explicit instead of discovered at launch.
- Under ~200KB of first-load JavaScript where possible
- Images: modern formats, explicit sizes, lazy-load below the fold
- Two font families max, display=swap, subset to latin
- No animation on the critical path; honor prefers-reduced-motion
What gets cut first
Third-party scripts, then carousels nobody asked for, then decorative video. The hero on this site is typography and one ambient glow — it costs almost nothing and carries the whole first impression.
A simple section executed exceptionally well beats five average ones — and it loads faster too.
Placeholder series — swap in your real voice and stories as you publish.