Definition
Accelerated mobile pages (AMP) is an open-source web framework developed by Google to provide a user-first format for web content.
The core idea behind AMP is to create fast, smooth, and user-friendly web pages for mobile devices. The technology optimizes mobile device browsing experience by restricting certain HTML, CSS, and JavaScript elements.
History of Accelerated Mobile Pages
The AMP project started back in 2015 as an open-source initiative spearheaded by Google to improve the performance of web content and advertisements. This was after the success of similar fast-loading formats implemented by Apple News and Facebook’s Instant Articles. It was later integrated into Google Search in February 2016 and later adopted by various publishers to create mobile-optimized content.
Accelerated Mobile Pages Technology
AMP is developed on three main components:
- AMP HTML: AMP replaces some HTML tags with custom AMP properties to provide reliable performance. For instance, the img tag is replaced with amp-img.
- AMP JS: This is a JavaScript framework that manages resource loading and it is responsible for the fast rendering of AMP HTML tags.
- AMP Cache: A content delivery network (CDN) that improves page load time by caching and serving AMP content.
AMP Advantages
- Supported by multiple platforms, including Google and Bing.
- Allows custom designs.
- Improves user experience on mobile devices.
- Pages are easy to build.
- Page loading is almost instant.
AMP Limitations
- You can only use one advertisement tag on an AMP page.
- Design elements are very restrictive.
- Google no longer marks AMP content with an AMP badge icon.