- Understand the main rendering types used on modern news sites.
- See how they affect Performance & Delivery and Core Web Vitals.
- Match rendering choices to your newsroom size and workflow.
- Get a simple checklist to talk with vendors and developers.
- Leave with a realistic next step, not a new buzzword.
Modern news websites live and die on Performance & Delivery.
If your pages feel slow, readers bounce, ad impressions drop, and subscribers never finish the sign-up flow. Yet “rendering types” still sound like a pure developer topic, far away from editors and media managers.
This guide is for digital editors, newsroom product teams, and media managers who need to make platform choices without pretending to be CTOs. We’ll walk through server side rendering for news sites, edge rendering, CDNs, image optimisation, and how they connect to Core Web Vitals like LCP, INP, and CLS.
By the end, you’ll know which questions to ask, what trade-offs to accept, and how to turn “make it faster” into a concrete plan rather than a wish.
Table of contents
- Why rendering matters so much for newsrooms
- What are the main rendering types for news sites?
- How does rendering affect Core Web Vitals (LCP, INP, CLS)?
- Which rendering approach fits your newsroom?
- How to brief vendors and dev teams about rendering
- FAQ
- Key takeaways
Why rendering matters so much for newsrooms?
Imagine two homepages: Site A loads the main headline, image, and navigation in under 1 second on a mid-range phone. Site B shows a blank screen, then a spinner, then finally “something” after 4–5 seconds. Same journalism, same story. Very different trust signal. Most of what readers feel as “fast” or “slow” comes down to where your pages are rendered and how assets are delivered: The browser on the user’s device. A central web server in one region. Many “edge” servers located close to the reader. A mix of prebuilt static pages and on-the-fly rendering. The good news: you don’t need to know every low-level detail. You only need enough to: Recognise the main rendering types. Understand their impact on Performance & Delivery. Push vendors toward realistic targets, not hand-waving.
Outcome: You now see rendering as a lever you can pull on performance, not just a technical curiosity.
What are the main rendering types for news sites?
Let’s translate developer jargon into newsroom language.
What is server-side rendering (SSR) in plain terms? Server-side rendering (SSR) means the page is built on a server every time a reader requests it. The server sends a ready-to-display HTML page to the browser.
Pros:
- Good first-load speed if the server is fast and nearby.
- SEO-friendly: search engines see full HTML.
- Easy to personalise (logged-in state, paywalls, etc.).
Cons:
- If your server is in one region, distant readers wait longer.
- Spikes in traffic can slow down rendering.
- Caching becomes critical and sometimes fragile.
- When you hear “classic CMS on a PHP server”, that’s often SSR.
What is static site generation (SSG)? Static site generation (SSG) prebuilds pages before anyone visits. The system builds HTML files in advance (for example, after publishing a story). Those files are served directly, usually via a CDN.
Pros:
- Extremely fast and stable for high-traffic, low-change pages, such as evergreen explainers.
- Very cache-friendly.
Cons:
- Requires new builds when content changes.
- Harder for heavily personalised or highly dynamic pages.
- What is client-side rendering (CSR)?
Client-side rendering (CSR) means the browser receives a mostly empty shell plus JavaScript. The JavaScript then builds the page on the reader’s device.
Pros:
- Very flexible interfaces and app-like interactions.
- Great once the app is loaded.
Cons:
- Slower first load, especially on weak devices or bad connections.
- Can hurt SEO and Core Web Vitals if mis-configured.
Many React-based frontends started as heavy CSR and have been slowly moving back to SSR plus edge rendering.
What is edge rendering? Edge rendering means the server that builds the page sits close to the reader, usually inside a CDN (content delivery network). A CDN is a global network of servers that cache and serve content nearby.
Think of it as SSR, but distributed.
Pros:
- Faster for international audiences.
- Keeps personalisation and paywalls while reducing latency.
- Plays nicely with modern frameworks and CDNs.
Cons:
- More modern stack, may demand stronger developer support.
- Debugging and logging can be more complex.
What is a hybrid approach?
Most modern news platforms are hybrid:
Static generation or cached HTML for sections and evergreen pieces.
SSR or edge rendering for homepages, article pages, and paywalled views.
Occasional CSR for interactive elements such as liveblogs, widgets, or data visualisations.
This is often the sweet spot for Performance & Delivery: fast by default, flexible at the edges.
Quick comparison
SSR (single server):
Typical use in news: traditional CMS pages.
Speed potential: good, depends on hosting.
Personalisation: strong.
Complexity: low to medium.
Edge rendering:
Typical use in news: home, article, and paywall views.
Speed potential: excellent globally.
Personalisation: strong.
Complexity: medium.
Static (SSG):
Typical use in news: evergreen content and special projects.
Speed potential: excellent.
Personalisation: weak.
Complexity: medium.
CSR-heavy:
Typical use in news: niche apps and tools.
Speed potential: variable, often slow for first paint.
Personalisation: strong.
Complexity: high.
Outcome: You can now label what your current site is doing and see what options exist beyond “our CMS is slow”.
Soft CTA:
Want to see how a newsroom-centric stack combines SSR, edge rendering, and smart caching out of the box? Book a short demo of our platform to walk through a live setup.
How does rendering affect Core Web Vitals (LCP, INP, CLS)?
Google’s Core Web Vitals are three key metrics tied to user experience.
LCP — Largest Contentful Paint:
How long it takes for the main content (headline, hero image) to appear.
INP — Interaction to Next Paint:
How quickly the site responds when users tap or click.
CLS — Cumulative Layout Shift:
How much the layout jumps around while loading, for example when ads push text.
Rendering touches all three.
How SSR and edge rendering help LCP
Because SSR and edge rendering send ready-made HTML from a nearby server, the browser can paint the main content quickly.
A practical target is LCP under 2.5 seconds on mobile for key pages.
You get there with good hosting, a global edge network, and optimised HTML and CSS.
How image optimisation fits in
For news sites, images often dominate LCP:
Use responsive image formats such as WebP or AVIF.
Serve correctly sized images per device.
Lazy-load images that are below the fold.
Many CDNs now offer built-in image optimisation, resizing and compressing on the fly.
How rendering influences INP
Heavy client-side rendering can hurt INP:
The browser is busy parsing large JavaScript bundles.
Clicks and taps feel ignored for a moment.
SSR and edge rendering can reduce the amount of JavaScript needed for the first view, improving responsiveness, especially on older or cheaper devices.
How CLS is affected
Rendering and ad or layout strategy define CLS:
SSR and static generation can bake in reserved spaces for ads and embeds.
CSR often injects elements later, causing jumps if not carefully handled.
Your rendering approach should include design rules: reserve space for ad slots, embed placeholders, and lazy-loaded components.
Outcome: You now see a direct line from rendering choices to measurable targets like LCP, INP, and CLS — not just vague “speed”.
Soft CTA:
We have a detailed guide to Core Web Vitals for newsrooms, including example dashboards and thresholds. Read it next to prioritise fixes before your next redesign.
Which rendering approach fits your newsroom?
There is no universal “best” rendering type. There is a best fit for your organisation.
Start with three simple questions
- Where is your audience? Local, regional, or global?
Global audiences benefit most from edge rendering and strong CDNs. - How dynamic is your content?
Constantly changing homepages and paywalls favour SSR or edge.
Evergreen backgrounders are perfect for static generation. - What internal tech capacity do you have?
Small teams may prefer managed platforms with opinionated defaults.
Larger organisations can afford custom mixes. - A simple decision sketch
- Small local newsroom, limited development support:
- Opinionated platform with SSR and CDN, minimal CSR.
- Automatic image optimisation and sensible caching rules.
- Mid-size national newsroom:
- Hybrid: edge-rendered home and article pages.
- Static builds for evergreen and special projects.
- Separate rendering strategy for liveblogs and elections.
- Large multi-brand publisher:
- Fully composable setup with a mix of static generation, SSR, and edge.
Global CDN, region-aware routing, advanced A/B testing.
If you’re unsure, a safe default is:
“Edge-rendered pages for home, article, and paywall. Static for evergreen. Minimal CSR.”
Outcome: You can now place your own newsroom on this spectrum and argue for a realistic target state instead of chasing buzzwords.
Soft CTA:
If your current vendor can’t clearly explain how they render pages and deliver assets, it may be time to benchmark alternatives. Use our newsroom Performance & Delivery checklist to run that comparison with vendors side by side.
How to brief vendors and dev teams about rendering
Here’s a simple checklist you can drop into your next RFP or internal ticket.
- Rendering and delivery checklist
- Rendering model
- Do key templates (home, article, section) use SSR, edge rendering, or something else?
- How is personalisation (paywall, login, geo) handled?
- CDN and geography
- Which CDN do we use, and in which regions are we strong or weak?
- Are we doing edge rendering, or just static asset caching?
- Images and media
- Is there automatic image optimisation for format, size, and compression?
- Can editors see image weight and variants inside the CMS?
- Core Web Vitals
- What are our current LCP, INP, and CLS for key templates?
- What targets will the new stack commit to?
- Operational reality
- Who owns configuration changes (vendor versus in-house team)?
- How are rollbacks handled if a performance change goes wrong?
- You can also link to a broader Performance & Delivery pillar article on your site to give colleagues more background context.
- Outcome: You now have a practical one-pager to guide conversations, not just a vague instruction to “make the site faster”.
FAQ
What is server-side rendering for news sites?
Server-side rendering means each page is built on a server when a reader requests it, and full HTML is sent to the browser. For news sites, SSR works well for article pages, homepages, and paywalls because it balances SEO, personalisation, and speed.
Do small local newsrooms really need edge rendering?
If your audience is mostly in one region and your hosting is close to them, classic SSR plus a CDN may be enough. Edge rendering becomes more valuable as your audience spreads across countries or continents, or when you run big global campaigns.
How does rendering affect Core Web Vitals like LCP and INP?
Rendering defines how quickly meaningful content appears (LCP) and how much JavaScript must run before the site responds to taps and clicks (INP). SSR and edge rendering usually help both metrics, while heavy client-side rendering can hurt them if not carefully optimised.
Is static site generation realistic for a busy newsroom?
Yes, but usually as part of a hybrid setup. Use static generation for evergreen content, backgrounders, and some special projects. Keep homepages, liveblogs, and paywalled content on SSR or edge rendering, where speed and freshness both matter.
Do I still need a CDN if I use edge rendering?
Yes. Edge rendering is often a capability provided by a CDN. Even if your pages are rendered at the edge, you still want a CDN to cache static assets like images, scripts, and styles as close to readers as possible.
Key takeaways
- Rendering types (SSR, edge, static, CSR) are business choices, not just tech trivia.
- Performance & Delivery directly affect reader trust, ad revenue, and subscription conversion.
- Edge rendering and CDNs bring your pages closer to readers, especially for global audiences.
- Core Web Vitals — LCP, INP, CLS — turn “fast enough” into concrete, trackable targets.
- Most modern news sites benefit from a hybrid approach mixing SSR, edge, and static.
- A simple checklist helps you brief vendors and internal dev teams with confidence.
- You don’t need to code; you just need the right questions and boundaries.
