Table of Contents

This is a guest post. Opinions and recommendations are the author’s own and not necessarily those of WP Rocket. It was first published on this blog in May 2018.

According to the new Google algorithm, a site is often indexed in search after determining the stability of its mobile version. Therefore, there’s nothing better than setting up AMP for your WordPress website.

AMP

AMP stands for Accelerated Mobile Pages. This open-source HTML framework enables web pages to load quickly, even pages that have tons of information and rich content like ads, videos, GIFs etc. Google initially announced the AAMP resolution in 2015 and now is taking further steps to index websites according to their AMP ranking. In simple terms, you can consider AMP as a streamlined version of your site that contains all the same information as the regular version, but removes extra elements that slow down the site.

AMP lets visitors access web pages quickly, rather than dealing with long load times on mobile. Follow this post and we’ll try to answer common questions related to AMP as well as providing a quick guide for WordPress sites.

Advantages of setting up Google AMP

Around 80% of page speed methods focus on optimizing your existing website to something that loads faster. But to boost page speed without any actual change to the website, Google AMP uses a stripped down and lightweight template to serve fast pages to visitors. Here are a few benefits of utilizing Google AMP on your WordPress site.

1.More Organic Traffic

WordPress is the biggest website builder available and incorporates thousands of features, including AMP, to optimize a website for any business. Before starting to utilize Google AMP on your site, one thing that may be on your mind, is whether AMP has an impact on your search engine rankings. People new to blogging often think that content is the only factor to rank a site on search engines. But your audience won’t read your content if it takes too long to load.

Obviously, Google AMP is not the only ranking factor but it can affect the CTR (click through rate) and impressions in search results. Depending on your industry and site,  57% or more of your traffic could be coming from mobile phones. Therefore, enabling Google AMP on your WordPress site can help drive more organic traffic.

2.Less Page Abandonment

Did you know that around 55% of the people leave a website if it takes more than 3 sec to load? So, by enabling faster pages with Google AMP, you may be able to boost your webpage speed and reduce the bounce rate.

Now that you know that importance of Google AMP, let’s discuss how you can enable it on your WordPress Site.

Install the AMP Plugin

The most recommended and easiest way to add Google AMP to your site is to install the AMP plugin. The AMP plugin was created by Automattic, which is also the official partner of Google’s AMP program.

Follow these steps to install Google AMP on your site

  • Log in to your WordPress site and go to plugins
  • Search for the “AMP” plugin
  • Find the AMP plugin made by Automattic
  • Click the install button
  • Activate the plugin

The plugin will instantly generate an AMP version of your website that can be located by adding /amp/ to the end of each webpage’s URL.

For instance, if you have a blog with the URL, www.example.com/beginers-guide-install-amp/, you can access the AMP version of this webpage at www.example.com/beginers-guide-install-amp/amp/.

Install Yoast SEO Plugin and Configure AMP

Click on the “add new” button and find the “Yoast amp” plugin. You will see the Glue for Yoast and AMP plugin, install and activate it. After that, go to Yoast > AMP and select the webpages you’d like to amend with AMP. By default, WordPress enables  AMP for “Posts”. However, you can also enable Google AMP for other web pages on your site.

Customization

You can customize the Google AMP version of your pages by clicking on the “Design Tab”. Users can make the following changes in the AMP version of a webpage

  • Add icons that are approximately 32 x 32 px in size.
  • Set a default image of 696 px wide for posts that don’t incorporate a featured image to display
  • Change the color, text, size, and link color, custom CSS and much more on a webpage
  • Apply new changes to meet the perfect display of AMP for your WordPress site.

Once you’re done customizing the best design for your website, click “save changes” and you’ve set up AMP for your WordPress site.

Google Analytics

If you’re also looking to track how visitors are reacting to the AMP version of your site, you can add Google Analytics to the AMP pages. Adding Google Analytics to all AMP pages can be quite complex as there is a need to modify the Analytics tracking code manually.  MonsterInsights has an add-on that enables an easy integration.

Testing AMP

You can check the Accelerated Mobile Pages error reports and index in the Google webmaster console. Make sure to check these reports every few days to keep track of AMP activity.

Features of Google AMP Plugin

Using the WordPress AMP plugin will let you accomplish the following:

  • Modify the website logo to appear on mobile devices
  • Add default and featured images to the blog posts
  • Enable comment section of your WordPress site
  • Add related posts
  • Set up Google Analytics
  • Create custom web pages

I hope you find this guide easy to follow to get started with using AMP on your WordPress site!


Comments (11)

Hi,

This is great article ever i read. Thanks for sharing. Nice website. keep it up.

regards,
hdfree4u movies

We are still looking into converting our website to AMP. Our concerns are that we may lose some of the essential widget functionality.

It seems AMP plugin has changed a lot since the article. Can you please update the article? And it would be better if you provide a recommendation on set up. Like which one will be better, native, paired or classic?

Is it compatible with AMP plugin? I am using Newspaper theme and Official AMP plugin. When I tested, it was loading the desktop theme.
Live website URL: Modo.pk

My site is loading fast in both mobile and desktop version. Is it still worth implement ing AMP? Does google favor more the site with AMP?

Very basic AMP guide as compare to other guides available online. What i really hoping to read was about WP-Rocket configuration with AMP version. Should we uncheck the cache of mobile version? or The cache of mobile version will assist the AMP version? Or in short, how WP-Rocket will act for AMP site? If there is a guide available, please refer it.

Thanks.

Hi Team,
I am using wp rocket on my website i.e. aperfectreview.com with amp mode on. But, sometimes the ads are not properly opening on amp pages. Is this the issue of amp cache? I have checked everything regarding the ad codes and amp settings.
Please suggest me something, i can do. Thanks in advance.

Regards,
Kartik

Latest Articles of Themes & Plugins
Subscribe to Our Newsletter

Stay in the loop with the latest WordPress and web performance updates.
Straight to your inbox every two weeks.

Get a Faster Website
in a Few Clicks

Setup Takes 3 Minutes Flat
Get WP Rocket Now