An energy efficient web
Why do websites cost energy? Sure, they have to be designed, developed, deployed and run on servers and devices. But let’s break it down to the physics. What is it that actually consumes energy? It’s a CPU or GPU that has to perform calculations, it’s a network of servers, routers and wi-fi antennas that have to connect to each other, it’s screens that have to produce photons to light up and display a website. So in every stage of a website, from its inception to a user visiting it, we have to minimise or avoid these aspects entirely.
Energy efficiency starts with design
Images, videos, custom fonts, they all require energy to download, process and display. The less resources you use, the more energy you save.
And not every resource has the same footprint:
- images require less energy than videos
- text requires less than images
- a system font requires less than a custom one
Fewer resources are not just a good way to save energy. Lightweight sites are faster, which is great for users and SEO. And text-heavy sites are typically more accessible.
Remember those photons? Dark mode can save up to 20-30% on OLED screens. So maybe it’s time to design a dark theme for your website. We're working on that ourselves too!
Energy efficient web development in the ’20s
It’s the roaring twenties again. Gone are the days where a developer simply edits the designed resources and copies them onto a web server. Instead we rely on package managers, build tools, continuous integration servers, cloud services (like a headless CMS), preview environments and finally our actual website. Needless to say, all these moving parts consume energy. It’s difficult to know just how much, as it’s a web of parts depending on other parts depending on other parts.
The good thing is that we can also use these modern development tools to save energy. We can automatically create smaller versions of the same videos and images, we can remove unused code from our styles, scripts and font files and generate static versions of our sites that only use all those connected cloud services during build.
Pick from the options to improve energy efficiency
Commit to energy efficient websites
We’ll continue to improve the energy efficiency of our websites. And will push our design partners, hosting providers and clients to do the same. We are committed to creating a more sustainable web. So all of us at De Voorhoede signed the Sustainable Web Manifesto. You should commit and sign it too.
Sign now