Website performance has a direct impact on the patient experience. Slow-loading pages, unstable layouts and unresponsive websites can all make it harder for prospective patients to find information and contact a clinic.
As part of Patient Pulse 2025, we tested 3,571 private healthcare websites against Google’s Core Web Vitals – the measures Google uses to assess website speed, responsiveness and visual stability.
Only 52% passed, leaving almost half with performance issues that could affect user experience.
What we measured
- Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): 3.17 seconds on average. Google’s recommended target is under 2.5 seconds. This measures how long it takes for the main page content to load.
- First Contentful Paint (FCP): 2.6 seconds on average. While many websites load reasonably quickly, Google’s recommended target is under 1.8 seconds.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): 0.07 on average, comfortably within Google’s recommended threshold of 0.1. This suggests that most clinic websites are visually stable, even if page speed could be improved.
Why it matters
Website performance affects three important areas.
Search visibility
Google uses Core Web Vitals as one of many signals when assessing website quality. A slow website can make it more difficult to compete for search visibility.
AI-powered search
Technical quality is also becoming increasingly important for AI-powered search platforms such as ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity. Websites with strong technical foundations are generally easier for these platforms to understand and recommend. As we explain in 98.6% of Private Healthcare Clinics Aren’t Ready for AI Search, preparing for AI-powered search is becoming an increasingly important part of digital marketing.
Patient experience
Fast, responsive websites make it easier for prospective patients to find information and contact a clinic. Several of the clinic leaders we spoke to told us they were proud of the care they provide, but felt their websites didn’t reflect the same standard.
“I don’t think our online presence matches the quality of our clinic.”
That was a recurring theme throughout our research.
The opportunity
Improving website performance is often one of the quickest ways to enhance both the patient experience and technical SEO. Many of the issues we identified can be resolved without replacing an existing website.
Some of the most common causes of poor performance include:
- Oversized images — large, unoptimised photos of the clinic, team or facilities are the single most common cause of slow loads.
- Too many plugins — particularly on WordPress sites, where 75% of clinics build their sites.
- Limited caching or under-powered hosting – making websites slower to load, especially during busy periods.
- Inefficient page builders – generating unnecessary code that affects loading speed.
In many cases, these improvements don’t need a new website. They simply require careful optimisation of the one you already have.
Where to start
Google’s free PageSpeed Insights tool is a useful place to begin. It will highlight how your website performs against Core Web Vitals and identify the areas that could benefit from improvement.
If you’d like a more detailed assessment, book a free website performance review and we’ll explain what’s affecting your website and where improvements are likely to have the greatest impact.
This article draws on Patient Pulse 2025, Figment’s original research into marketing in UK private healthcare. Read the full report.
More from Patient Pulse 2025
- 98.6% of clinics aren’t ready for AI search
- The WordPress configuration problem
- Only 5% of clinics use a CRM
- Read the full Patient Pulse 2025 report »
Book a free, no-obligation review of your clinic’s online presence »
