After Google’s Core Web Vitals update, page speed is part of keeping visitors on the site and of how the site is ranked. The hosting stack has to be current.
Older hard drives, and even a SATA SSD, move data more slowly than NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express) storage. NVMe can transfer data several times faster than a SATA SSD. That is what brings page load times down.
Apache and Nginx are common web servers. For high-traffic sites, and for WordPress in particular, LiteSpeed is the web server to compare.
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Caching: server-level cache cuts repeated PHP work.
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Traffic spikes: the server is less likely to fall over when visitors arrive at once.
When you compare hosting plans, do not stop at the disk size. Check whether the disk is NVMe and whether the web server is LiteSpeed. Speed is a large part of SEO.
Frequently asked questions
Short answers to the questions this article is most often asked.
1 Why does NVMe matter when choosing hosting?
NVMe moves data faster than a SATA SSD, and that shows up in page load time. Check that the disk is NVMe, not only how large it is.
2 What does LiteSpeed change?
Server-level cache cuts repeated PHP work. A traffic spike is less likely to take the site down.
3 Does speed affect SEO?
Yes. After Core Web Vitals, page speed is part of how a hosting plan is chosen and how the site is ranked.