Autoptimize 2.1 and first Power-Up released

Yesterday evening I released Autoptimize 2.1 and the first Power-Up to manage critical CSS has been made available as a optional service over at criticalcss.com. This short video explains some of the logic behind the Autoptimize Critical CSS Power-Up:


But let’s not forget about Autoptimize 2.1! The new features include:
  • Autoptimize now appears in the admin-toolbar with an easy view on cache size and the possibility to purge the cache (thanks to Pablo Custo)
  • A “More Optimization”-tab is shown with info about optimization tools- and services.
  • settings-screen now accepts protocol-relative URL for CDN base URL
  • admin GUI updated and responsiveness added
  • If cache size becomes too big, a mail will be sent to the site admin
  • power-users can enable Autoptimize to pre-gzip the autoptimized files with a filter
  • new (smarter) defaults for JS and CSS optimization

Although excluding jQuery from autoptimization by default might seem counter-intuitive, the “smarter” defaults should allow more Autoptimize installs to work out-of-the-box (including on sites run by people who might not be inclined to troubleshoot/ reconfigure Autoptimize in the first place).
And thanks to the release I now have a better idea of the number of active installs (which wordpress.org lists as +100000); 2.1 was downloaded 3239 times yesterday evening and it is listed as running on 1.8% sites. Simple math learns that Autoptimize is currently active on approx. 180000 WordPress websites. Let’s aim for 200K by the end of 2016! 🙂