This translation has not been editorially reviewed yet. The German version is authoritative. Deutsche Fassung →
Embedding web fonts locally: the easiest finding to fix
If fonts are loaded from a third-party server, a connection to it is established on every page visit — with the visitor's IP address. The check establishes whether fonts are embedded externally, and names the provider.
- This is the finding with the best ratio of effort to effect: download the font files, put them on your own server, reference them in the stylesheet. After that, the connection is gone, and the page usually loads faster too.
- Be careful with website builders and templates: they often embed fonts in several places — in the template head, in a module, in a stylesheet loaded afterwards. Replacing just one of them isn't enough.
- The side effect on load time is measurable and shows up in the Core Web Vitals audit area — an external font costs connection setup time and blocks text rendering.
