Mobile Friendliness Tests: Nobody wants to sit there and click around on their phone just to look at your website. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that, according to Google, 50% of people use a business more than once if its website isn’t mobile-friendly.
A mobile-friendliness test is a tool that analyzes how well your website looks and works on mobile devices. This includes different types of smartphones and tablets, as well as some e-readers. Of course, you can check it on your smartphone. But what about the hundreds of other types of phones and tablets your visitors use? The test can be awarded a grade or an easy pass and often includes a list of improvements to consider. But how can you be sure that your website is mobile-friendly? Then let’s look at what it means to be mobile-friendly and how it can affect your SEO. But first… what is a mobile test?
Today we’re going to include a series of mobile-friendly tests that will give you clear answers and practical tips. With each test, we check our website so you can directly compare the results. A good mobile-friendliness test looks at many different things. This includes technical features such as:
- space velocity
- Use CSS and Javascript
- Plugins like Flash or Java
also include usability features such as:
- Is the text readable without Zoom?
- Does the content fit on the screen without side-scrolling?
- Are the links and buttons easy to click?
Although most cell phone tests consider the same factors, not all give the same results. That’s why we’ve compiled a list of the top 10 mobile apps for you to consider.
Website Grader
Website Grader is HubSpot’s test, based on data from Google Lighthouse. It offers a 30-point assessment of the factors affecting your mobile friendship. It shows you easy-to-understand recommendations to improve your website. Not sure what these recommendations mean? Click here to access free video tutorials on creating a mobile responsive website.
Highlights:
It also marks the performance, SEO, and security of your website at the same time. Provide Actionable Tips: Yes
Google Mobile Friendliness Test
Instead of a grading scale like other tools, Google’s mobile test offers a simple pass/fail. It could be “Your site is mobile friendly” or “Your site is not mobile friendly.” If not, a list of reasons why the operation failed is displayed. (We’ve included a screenshot of the failed website results below. Your URL has been hidden to protect the innocent.) The downside of Google’s mobile-friendliness tool is that it checks individual pages and not your site as a whole.
Highlights:
If you click on the causes of the error, you will be shown a screenshot of the affected area. Provide Actionable Tips: Yes
Page Speed Insights
Google’s Page Speed ​​​​​​Insights are like a bigger, more powerful cousin of their mobile test. Instead of a simple pass/fail rating, you’ll receive individual ratings on various performance metrics that have a direct impact on your user experience. The result of this is that you get a deeper understanding of how your website is performing. The downside is that you learn what to do if you don’t understand the terms. This makes Page Speed Insights ideal for websites backed by a web developer or development team.
Highlights:
It provides a detailed list of possible diagnostic and improvement opportunities, along with an estimate of potential time savings.
Provide Actionable Tips: Yes
MobiReady
MobiReady starts with an interactive visualization of how your website looks on different devices. Below that, you get a rating between 1 and 5 and compare it to the top 1,000 Alexa ratings for that context. Below is a list of good and bad results that explain what, why, and where the problems are occurring.
Highlights:
All failed results include a link to fix the problem. Provide Actionable Tips: Yes
WebPage Test
WebPageTest’s results start with simple summaries that are easy to understand even if you’re not that tech savvy. If you are more experienced as a developer, clicking on the results will give you more detailed information about your performance issues and related tips.
Pingdom
Pingdom gives you both a letter grade and a score from 1-100. Below is a short list of performance improvement recommendations. If you click on it, understandable explanations of your problems will be displayed. These explanations won’t turn a beginner into an expert, but they do provide a good starting point.
Bing Mobile-Friendly Test
The Bing Mobile-Friendly Test is a quick and easy tool perfect for a quick check-in. Like Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test, the Bing tool gives you a simple pass/fail and a list of reasons. Unlike Google’s tests, many of Bing’s factors are unexplained.
Highlights:
It shows a simple representation of what your website would look like on mobile.
Click Actionable Tips: Type
Site Checker
SiteChecker provides a rating out of 100 and lots of information about your site’s performance. And although it calls it the “Mobile-Friendly Test”, you’ll find a huge list of optimization recommendations for both desktop and mobile. You’ll see suggestions for content, coding, linking, social media, and more. And for each issue, you’ll find a “How to fix it” button that provides information on why it’s important and what to do.
Highlights:
It also provides a detailed overview of your website’s CSS and JavaScript files.
Provide Actionable Tips: Yes
Price: Free with a 7-day trial
Woorank
WooRank is a marketing SaaS known for its SEO extensions and plugins. Your website rating tool analyzes your website’s performance, including its mobile-friendliness. In a few seconds, you will get a score between 1 and 100; However, you must subscribe to their service to understand the reasons why. This makes the WooRank test a great option for those who are already looking for a list of SEO tools.
Highlights:
Signing up for an account will link your results to all of these tools.
There are actionable tips: When registering
Browser Stack Mobile Friendliness Tests
The BrowserStack tool is different from the others on this list because it is a responsive design test. (We’ll explain the differences in more detail later.) While you don’t get an opinion or a list of improvements, you can see how your site performs on more than a dozen different devices. We’re including it in the list because it’s very useful in conjunction with other mobile-friendliness tests. Your visitors will judge your site by how it looks, just as they will judge you by how it works.
Highlights:
Interactive tests can also be run on over 3,000 different browsers and devices with premium accounts.
Giving active tips: no
What Does It Mean to be Mobile Friendliness Tests?
“Mobile-friendly” means your website (or app) looks good and works well on a smartphone or tablet. Many factors contribute to mobile-friendliness, but they all come with a good user experience. To be considered mobile-friendly, your website needs to be fast, simple, and user-friendly no matter what device the reader is using.
Does Mobile Friendliness Affect Search Engine Optimization?
Yes, mobile-friendliness affects your SEO. A little more obvious is Google’s announcement in 2015 that it would “improve the ranking of user-friendly pages in mobile search results”. That’s a big deal considering that according to Sistrix Research, 64% of searches are done on mobile.
But What about Desktop Search?
Does friendship on mobile affect you? This is becoming clear; However, in 2018, Google announced its intention to move to mobile-first indexing. It’s a fancy way of saying that Google considers your mobile version first when choosing what content to index. And while indexing and ranking are not the same thing, we know that Google maintains only one index. This means that your mobile-friendliness can be expected to affect how well you rank in desktop searches.
Is Responsiveness the Same as Mobile Compatibility?
Responsive design is a great way to be mobile-friendly, but they are not the same. Think of mobile-friendliness as the goal and responsive design as the way to get there. Responsiveness means that your website automatically adapts to the device the reader is using. text etc
Don’t let a Bad Mobile Experience Put you in a Pinch
As you can see from the screenshots, the scores that you receive can vary wildly. Because of this, it’s important not to get too hung up on chasing a number. Use your grade as a guide, but focus on the improvements, and work toward a great mobile experience for your visitors.