Enable Gzip Compression via htaccess

enable gzip compression

Gzip compression is a method of compressing files to reduce their size, which can improve website loading speed and performance. By enabling Gzip compression via your htaccess file, you can reduce the size of your website files and speed up page load times for your visitors. In this tutorial, we’ll walk you through the steps to enable Gzip compression via htaccess.

Step 1: Check if mod_deflate is enabled

The first step is to check if mod_deflate is enabled on your server. You can do this by adding the following code to your htaccess file:

<IfModule mod_deflate.c>
# mod_deflate is enabled
</IfModule>

If mod_deflate is enabled, the code between the IfModule tags will be executed. If not, you’ll need to contact your hosting provider to enable it.

Step 2: Add the Gzip compression code

Once you’ve confirmed that mod_deflate is enabled, you can add the Gzip compression code to your htaccess file. The code specifies which file types to compress, and includes some browser bug fixes. Here’s the code:

# BEGIN Gzip compression htaccess
<IfModule mod_deflate.c>
  # Compress HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Text, XML and fonts
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/javascript
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/rss+xml
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/vnd.ms-fontobject
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-font
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-font-opentype
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-font-otf
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-font-truetype
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-font-ttf
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-javascript
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/xhtml+xml
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/xml
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE font/opentype
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE font/otf
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE font/ttf
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE image/svg+xml
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE image/x-icon
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/css
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/javascript
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/plain
  AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/xml

  # Remove browser bugs (only needed for really old browsers)
  BrowserMatch ^Mozilla/4 gzip-only-text/html
  BrowserMatch ^Mozilla/4\.0[678] no-gzip
  BrowserMatch \bMSIE !no-gzip !gzip-only-text/html
  Header append Vary User-Agent
</IfModule>
# END Gzip compression htaccess

# BEGIN Connection keep-alive
<ifModule mod_headers.c>
Header set Connection keep-alive
</ifModule>
# END Connection keep-alive

This code compresses files with the specified file types, and includes some browser bug fixes that are only needed for old browsers. The Header append Vary User-Agent line tells the browser to cache different versions of the file based on the user agent, which can help improve caching performance.

Additionally, you can enable keep-alive connections to improve the loading speed of your website. Keep-alive connections allow multiple requests to be sent over a single TCP connection, which can reduce the overhead of establishing a new connection for each request.

Step 3: Test your website
After adding the Gzip compression and keep-alive connection code to your htaccess file, it’s a good idea to test your website to make sure it’s working correctly. You can use a tool like GTmetrix or Google PageSpeed Insights to test your website’s page load speed and check if Gzip compression is enabled. If everything looks good, you should notice a significant improvement in your website’s loading speed and performance.

Conclusion:
Enabling Gzip compression via htaccess is a simple way to improve your website’s loading speed and performance. By following the steps outlined in this tutorial, you can reduce the size of your website files and speed up page load times for your visitors. Remember to test your website after making changes to your htaccess file to ensure everything is working correctly.


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