Uncacheable page: why it slows your site

What it means

The page was delivered without a cached copy, meaning the server generated it fresh each time. This can happen when the response carries a no-store or private cache-control header, or when a CDN bypass was triggered.

Why it matters

Uncached pages increase server load and response time, which can push LCP past the 2.5s threshold and degrade INP on repeat visits. For Googlebot, repeated uncached responses mean more rendering work and potentially fewer pages crawled in a given budget. AI agents and crawlers that respect cache headers may also see slower responses when pages bypass the CDN.

How to fix it

1. Add a cache-control header with a reasonable max-age (e.g., max-age=3600) for static resources and pages that don't change frequently.
2. Replace no-store with no-cache if you want fresh validation without full regeneration, or remove the private directive for public pages.
3. Configure your CDN to cache HTML responses at the edge, or set up dynamic caching for pages with predictable query parameters.

Example

Cache-Control: no-store, private

Cache-Control: public, max-age=3600, stale-while-revalidate=86400

no-store forces every request to the origin and bypasses the CDN. For static or slowly-changing pages, allow public caching so the CDN serves them fast.

When it's not a problem

This notice is often harmless for pages that genuinely change on every request, such as real-time dashboards or personalized content. It is also expected when you intentionally serve uncached responses to ensure users always see the latest data.

How Crawlinx detects it

We read the Cache-Control response header. Directives like no-store, no-cache, or private mean the page can't be cached by a CDN or browser, so we flag it with the header value we saw.

How common is it?

7261 audited sites in our corpus currently show this issue. The breakdowns below show which platforms, gatekeepers, verticals and countries are most exposed.

FAQ

Does caching affect SEO?

Indirectly. Uncacheable pages load slower from the origin on every hit, which drags Core Web Vitals (TTFB, LCP) — and speed is a ranking signal.

When should a page be uncacheable?

Personalized or authenticated pages (dashboards, carts) that must not be shared between users. Public content pages should almost always be cacheable.