The Anatomy of a Page Load
Walk through what actually happens between typing a URL and seeing a fully interactive page, so you understand where performance is won or lost.
From URL to Pixels
A page load runs a fixed sequence: DNS, TCP/TLS handshake, request, response, parse, render, interactivity. Each step adds latency — and shows you where to optimize.
DNS Resolution
First the browser resolves a hostname to an IP via DNS. A cold lookup can cost 20-120ms; caching and dns-prefetch cut it down.
<link rel="dns-prefetch" href="https://cdn.example.com">All lessons in this course
- What is Web Performance?
- Why Performance Matters
- Key Performance Metrics
- The Anatomy of a Page Load