SEO

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)

By Paul Brock·Updated on 22-04-2026
TL;DR

LCP measures how long it takes for the largest visible element on a page to load — the primary measure of perceived loading speed.

Largest Contentful Paint measures the moment the largest content element in the viewport renders (usually a hero image, video poster or large text block). Users experience this as 'the page has loaded'. Below 2.5s is good, above 4s poor.

Example

A fintech landing page loads in 5.2s; the culprit is a 680KB unoptimised WebP. After compression to 90KB and adding <link rel="preload">, LCP drops to 1.8s.

Frequently asked questions

What are the biggest LCP killers?

Large unoptimised images, render-blocking JavaScript, slow server response (TTFB), no CDN, webfonts without font-display:swap.

Related terms

Core Web VitalsInteraction to Next Paint (INP)Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)PagespeedRender-blocking resourcesTime to First Byte (TTFB)Lazy loading

Further reading

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