Does the Speculation Rules API boost web speed? I tested it

The Speculation Rules API is a browser feature designed to enhance web navigation speed by prefetching and prerendering pages, specifically for Chromium-based browsers like Chrome, Edge, and Opera. The API allows developers to specify which pages to load in the background through a simple JSON script, improving perceived load times when users navigate between pages. In practical tests, prerendering significantly reduced perceived load times by nearly half, compared to pages without it, while prefetching provided moderate improvements by reducing network fetch delays. However, the API is most effective in scenarios with predictable navigation patterns, such as e-commerce checkouts or content-heavy pages, and can lead to wasted resources if overused on unpredictable navigation flows. The eagerness setting in the API determines the timing of prerendering, with "moderate" being optimal for hover-based triggers. Despite its benefits, the API does not function in non-Chromium browsers like Firefox and Safari, and caution is advised to avoid unintended side effects, such as premature analytics firing, during prerendering.

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