Static Website

I’ve heard about static websites and that they are fast, can we have one?

Static vs Dynamic

A Static Website is a term used for websites that do not change. We at Huyton Web would create the website, add your content and put it live. Any changes to the live site would need to be made by Huyton Web (or another development company) as there is no facility for you to update it yourself.

The upside to a static website is that it is fast, very fast, because the server will simply send a requested page to a visitor's device without having to retrieve data from elsewhere like a database or file system. The downside to a static website is any changes to content, whether they are simple (e.g. a spelling change) or complex (such as a new section), must be made by a developer.

Static websites are hard to change, but very fast, the opposite is a CMS (Content Management System) that is simple to update, but a little slower than a static website

CMS

When a CMS is added to a website, the data then comes from a database and is injected into the page before sending it to a visitor, this adds time to page loading which takes a little bit longer than a static site. We can add caching (so a visitor will see a recent, but stored version) which can speed up page loading to almost that of a static website, but there is always a trade off of flexibility over performance with a CMS website.

Headless

So, is there a way to have the flexibility of the CMS and the speed of the Static Website? Yes!

We create a Static Website AND a CMS Website. The CMS site would be hidden from visitors as its roles would be to serve content to the Static Website and allow the content editing, it does not allow a visitor to view the website. The Static Website server will check for new content from the CMS Website and recreate the Static Website if it finds any changes. This is known as making the CMS Headless.

This gives CMS flexibility and Static Website speed. Of course, for this we must create two full websites instead of one and connect them, which will take more time (unless you already have a CMS) and a larger budget.

This website uses a Headless CMS for the backend and a static website for the frontend and as you can see is fast.

If you want the best website you can and you have the time and the budget, then Headless is the architecture for you. If your priority is speed or you don’t plan to change anything on the site, then Static is probably suitable for you. If you want your website ready as quick as possible and you want to be able to manage your own content, then CMS could be the right choice for you.

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We have put these pages together to explain some of the core concepts, how they relate to us and, more importantly, you, because over the years we've been asked questions quite frequently. If there is something you don't understand or would like clarity on please contact us and we'll do our best to explain.