Original Research
We tested 113 Houston dental websites.
74% fail Google's speed test.
Between February 12 to March 3, 2026, we ran every dental practice website in Houston through Google's PageSpeed Insights API on a simulated mobile connection. These are the results.
By Borhen Benltaief, SEOParity. Published March 2026.
113
Dental sites tested
74%
Fail Core Web Vitals on mobile
38/100
Average mobile PageSpeed score
4.7s
Average mobile load time
87/113
Run WordPress
41/87
WordPress sites use Elementor
Methodology
We collected the website URL for every dental practice in Houston, Texas listed in Google Maps and major dental directories. 113 sites had a working homepage that returned a 200 status code.
Each site was tested using the Google PageSpeed Insights API (version 5) with mobile emulation (Moto G Power, simulated 4G connection). This is the same test Google runs internally when evaluating page experience for ranking purposes.
We recorded the overall Performance score (0 to 100), Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS), and pass/fail status for all three Core Web Vitals. Testing was conducted between February 12 to March 3, 2026.
All data comes from Google's own publicly available tools. No private or proprietary measurement was used. Platform detection (WordPress, Elementor, Squarespace, Wix) was based on response headers and HTML source signatures.
Score distribution
Mobile PageSpeed scores across 113 sites. Google considers 90+ "good."
What we found wrong
Page builders loading before content
41 out of 87 WordPress dental sites load Elementor, a visual page builder that ships a 400KB+ JavaScript rendering engine. The browser downloads, parses, and executes this code before a patient sees anything on the page. On a typical mobile connection, that means 3 to 5 seconds of blank screen. Most visitors leave after 3.
Uncompressed images
Hero images on dental sites averaged 1.2MB. Many load full-resolution office photos and staff portraits without any compression, responsive sizing, or modern formats like WebP. One site loaded a 6.8MB background image on its homepage. On mobile, that image alone takes 12 seconds to download.
Too many plugins running at once
The average WordPress dental site had 14 active plugins. Each plugin can inject its own CSS and JavaScript files into every page load, whether or not that page needs them. The result is render-blocking resources that caching can't fix.
No server-side rendering
WordPress generates HTML on the server for each request, but the JavaScript-heavy front ends built by most page builders negate this advantage. The browser still waits for the full JS bundle to hydrate before anything becomes interactive. Sites built on modern frameworks score 2x to 3x higher on the same Google test.
What this means for practice owners
Google confirmed in 2021 that page experience, including Core Web Vitals, is a ranking signal. Sites that pass get a measurable advantage in mobile search results. Sites that fail get pushed down. In a local market like Houston dental, where patients compare 3 to 4 practices before calling, the site that loads first gets seen first.
The 74% failure rate means most Houston dental practices are competing with a handicap they don't know about. Their marketing team buys Google Ads to drive traffic to a site that takes 4.7 seconds to load. Patients tap the back button before the phone number appears.
The practices with fast sites aren't doing anything exotic. They either built on a modern platform from the start, or they rebuilt their WordPress site on one. The technology exists. The data says most practices haven't made the switch yet.