How Google may be slowing down AMP by not using direct links to publishers

One of the biggest disadvantages for publishers in using AMP — the accelerated mobile pages format — is that Google will not show a publisher’s actual URL when displaying AMP pages. Google says this is so AMP pages load quickly. However, using a publisher’s URL might hardly slow a page down. In fact, using Google’s URL might actually cause AMP pages to load more slowly.

Google is serves AMP pages from its cache, which causes AMP page URLs to appear as if they are from Google. It does this, because Google claims that this means the page will load more quickly than serving from the publisher’s site.

Would skipping the Google cache really hurt? What if Google didn’t use its own cache? What if it sent people directly to a publisher’s AMP page on the publisher’s site. Would that really slow the experience down that much?

Our testing suggests that the experience wouldn’t be slower and, in fact, might even be faster. But Google says it has no plans to make a change.

[Read the full article on Search Engine Land.]

About The Author

Danny Sullivan

Danny Sullivan was a journalist and analyst who covered the digital and search marketing space from 1996 through 2017. He was also a cofounder of Third Door Media, which publishes Search Engine Land, Marketing Land, MarTech Today and produces the SMX: Search Marketing Expo and MarTech events. He retired from journalism and Third Door Media in June 2017. You can learn more about him on his personal site & blog He can also be found on Facebook and Twitter.