User experience (UX) is the total impression a visitor forms while interacting with a website, app, or product — covering everything from how fast the page loads, to how easy it is to find what they came for, to whether the form works on the first try, to how trustworthy the page feels. UX sits above the search engine optimization (SEO) floor in WordPress performance work: SEO sets the threshold Google uses to rank a page, but UX is what determines whether the visitor stays, converts, or leaves. The metrics most often used to track UX on real visitors include time-to-interactive on the pages that drive conversions, bounce rate by device type, scroll depth on long-form pages, and 75th-percentile loading metrics from real-user monitoring (RUM). UX is also a design and content discipline — clear labels, predictable navigation, and accessible interactions matter as much as raw speed.
Glossary entry