What Is WordPress Caching?

Caching stores reusable output so WordPress can do less repeated work when serving visitors.

Why WordPress needs caching

A dynamic WordPress request can involve PHP execution, database queries, theme templates and plugin logic. Repeating all of that for identical public pages is often unnecessary.

Page cache

A page cache stores generated page output so later visitors can receive a prepared response more quickly.

Browser cache

Browser caching lets a visitor's browser reuse static assets for an appropriate period instead of downloading them on every page view.

Object and server caches

Object caching and server-level caches solve different layers of the request. Hosting architecture determines which are available and how they should interact with a plugin.

What caching does not fix

Caching cannot shrink oversized images, eliminate third-party scripts or repair slow uncached application logic. Treat it as one layer of a broader performance system.