FCP
The FCP page of RUM Monitoring shows how long real visitors look at a blank page before the first text or image appears.
The FCP page of RUM Monitoring shows how long your real visitors look at a blank page before the first text or image appears. It also shows the pages and countries where the wait is longest.
What FCP means
FCP (First Contentful Paint) is how long until the first text or image appears. Until then, the visitor sees a blank page. A long blank page makes visitors think that the site is broken.
FCP is not a Core Web Vital. Google does not judge it, but it helps explain LCP. A high FCP usually points to slow hosting or to heavy code that blocks the display.
FCP thresholds
| Band | FCP value |
|---|---|
| Good | 1.8 s or less |
| Needs improvement | 3 s or less |
| Poor | More than 3 s |
The headline value is the value of a typical visit: 3 out of 4 page loads were this fast or faster. See Metrics and thresholds.
Before you start
- RUM Monitoring needs the RUM script on your pages. See Install the RUM script.
- In the sidebar, open Web performance > RUM Monitoring > FCP.
- Select Phone or Desktop in the filter dock. Every card on the FCP page shows the selected device only.
You can also filter by date, URL Path, Country and Browser, and compare with an earlier period. See Filters and the device.
The FCP verdict
The verdict is one sentence at the top of the FCP page. It shows only when it says something new:
- "On Phone, FCP needs work" when the typical FCP is not Good. If the value is only a little over the limit, it adds "Just over the limit."
- "On Phone, FCP passes but is close to the limit" when the typical FCP is Good, but within 10% of 1.8 s.
- "On Phone, FCP got 20% slower" or "got 20% better" when compare is on and FCP changed by 15% or more.
The verdict needs 30 visits or more. If FCP passes with room to spare, the FCP page shows no verdict. The FCP page has no Site Health Monitoring banner, because FCP is not a Core Web Vital.
First Contentful Paint card
The First Contentful Paint on Phone card (or on Desktop) has two tiles and one chart. Click a tile to show its chart.
- First Contentful Paint: the typical FCP in the period, colored by its band.
- Good visits: the share of visits with a Good FCP. The tile is green at 75% or more, orange at 50% or more, and red below 50%.
A tile from fewer than 30 visits is gray, with a note such as Only 12 visits. A tile without data shows Not measured for this period.
The FCP chart
For First Contentful Paint, the chart shows the typical FCP over time. Two lines mark the Good limit (1.8 s) and the Poor limit (3 s). With compare on, a dashed line shows the earlier period.
For Good visits, the chart shows the share of Good, Needs improvement and Poor visits over time, stacked to 100%. This chart has no pass line, because Google does not judge FCP.
Use the Hour, Day, Week or Month control to group the chart. A note on a day of the chart tells you that VitalSentinel changed what RUM Monitoring measures, or calculated stored data again, on that day.
Google and your own visitors
The Google and your own visitors card compares your FCP with the FCP that Google publishes for your site. It has four tiles:
| Tile | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Google, Phone and Google, Desktop | Chrome visits to the whole site, last 28 days |
| Your visitors, Phone and Your visitors, Desktop | All visits in the selected period and filters |
Google rates your site from Chrome visits only. RUM Monitoring measures all of your visitors, so the two can differ. Click Open CrUX Monitoring to see Google's data. If Google has not published data for your site, the card says "Google has not published data for this site yet". See CrUX Monitoring.
If CrUX Monitoring is not set up for the domain, the card shows Set up CrUX Monitoring instead. A tile without a figure says "Google has not published enough visits for this device yet." or "Too few visits measured this yet."
Where it is slow
The Where it is slow card lists your pages for the selected device. By default, the pages with the most visits that were not Good come first.
| Column | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Page | The page address. The menu opens the page in other modules. |
| Visits | The visits to the page in the period |
| Google clicks | The clicks from Google web search, from Google Search Console |
| FCP | The typical FCP of the page, with its change when compare is on |
| Good visits | The share of visits with a Good FCP |
| Visits affected | The visits on the page that had an FCP above the Good limit |
Click a header to sort. A page with fewer than 30 visits shows a dash in FCP. Owners and admins can click Watch in Page Monitoring on a row. Fix the first page in the list first.
Countries
The Countries card shows a world map for the selected device. Each country has the color of its typical FCP: Good, Needs improvement or Poor. Low sample means too few visits to rate, and No data means no visits.
Hover a country to see its visits, its figures, the change from the earlier period and the visits affected.
How to improve FCP
The FCP page has no phase breakdown. FCP starts after TTFB, so check the TTFB page first. Then do these steps:
- Make your server answer faster with caching and a CDN.
- Remove or delay scripts in the head of the page.
- Put the styles that the first screen needs in the HTML, and load the other styles later.
- Make web fonts show text at once with a fallback font.
Troubleshooting
Why does the FCP page have no breakdown card?
The FCP page shows the shared cards only: the trend, Google's figure, the slow pages and the countries. To find the cause of a slow FCP, open the TTFB and LCP pages. Their Where the time goes cards show the phases.
Why does the FCP page say "No First Contentful Paint data for this period"?
There were no visits on the selected device in these dates and filters. Select the other device in the dock, select a longer date range, or remove a filter.
Why is FCP good but LCP poor?
The first text or image shows fast, but the main content shows late. Usually the largest image loads late or is large. Open the LCP page and check its Where the time goes card.
Related
- Overview - all Core Web Vitals, filters and page-view limits
- TTFB - the server wait that comes before FCP
- LCP - when the main content shows
- Metrics and thresholds - the limits of every metric
- CrUX Monitoring - Google's own data for your site
