10 Signs You Need a Website Redesign: How to Measure Each One, Thresholds, and When a Partial Fix Is Enough (2026)

"Our website is probably looking a bit old." That thought usually starts with appearance: a competitor relaunched, or the text looked tiny on a phone.

But looking dated is not, on its own, a reason to redesign. And a site that still looks fine can need rebuilding anyway, because the platform underneath is reaching end of support or it no longer meets European rules.

This article sets out ten signs that a redesign is worth considering, each with a way to measure it and a threshold. The evidence comes from primary sources: Google Search Central and web.dev, W3C's WCAG 2.2, the European Accessibility Act, the Dutch Data Protection Authority (AP), HTTP Archive's Web Almanac and WebAIM. It also explains how to tell when a partial fix is enough.

Main sources for this article

• Google Search Central guidance on page experience, mobile-first indexing and site moves
• web.dev's Core Web Vitals thresholds and the Vodafone and Rakuten 24 case studies
• HTTP Archive's Web Almanac 2024 (Performance and Accessibility) and the WebAIM Million 2026
• W3C's WCAG 2.2, the European Accessibility Act (Directive 2019/882) and the Dutch AP's cookie banner checks

What this article answers	Short answer
Which signs point to a redesign?	Speed, mobile, editing, maintenance, tracking, search, content, accessibility, cookies, languages (Section 1)
How do I measure each one?	With free tools and clear thresholds, summarised in the Section 1 table (Sections 2–11)
Full redesign or partial fix?	Count the signs and check whether a foundation sign applies (Section 13)
What does it cost and how long?	Fixes from a few thousand euros; rebuilds from around €5,000 (Section 14)
Where do I start?	A 30-minute self-check, then a conversation backed by numbers (Sections 18–19)

1. The ten signs and how to measure them

Turn "old" into something you can measure

"Old" means different things to different people. Some mean the design trend. Others mean the hassle of asking an agency every time a sentence changes.

To avoid a wrong decision, start by translating the feeling into measurable signs. The table below lists the ten signs in this article, how to measure each, and the threshold at which to start thinking about a redesign.

Sign	How to measure (free)	Start thinking when
1. Hard to read or tap on mobile	Real phone, Lighthouse	Text under 16px, buttons under 24px square
2. Slow	PageSpeed Insights, Search Console	LCP over 2.5 s, INP over 200 ms, CLS over 0.1
3. Your team cannot edit it	Log how many days an update takes	Changing text needs an agency
4. Maintenance is out of date	Check server and CMS versions	PHP or similar is out of, or near end of, support
5. Results unmeasured or falling	GA4, enquiry counts	Enquiries are not tracked
6. Not found in search	Search Console	Key pages not indexed, impressions sharply down year on year
7. Content lags the business	Content inventory	30%+ of pages outdated, main service missing
8. Accessibility gaps	WAVE, Lighthouse, keyboard test	Low contrast, missing alt text
9. Cookies and legal notices outdated	Watch the consent banner	Tracking tags fire before consent
10. Not reaching foreign readers	hreflang, English page structure	English is a literal translation, language switch broken

Signs 3 and 4 are foundation problems. The others can often be fixed in place if the foundation is sound. These two cannot be solved by adding anything on top. Section 13 explains how to use that difference.

Don't decide before you measure

Do not treat the ten signs as an exam you must pass in full. The aim is to decide the order in which to fix things.

If only speed is poor, image compression or a server change may be enough. Rebuilding the whole site would cost more and risk more search volatility. Conversely, if five or more signs apply, patching tends to break something else each time.

2. Sign 1: Hard to read or tap on mobile

Google evaluates the mobile version

In October 2023 Google announced that the move to mobile-first indexing was complete. Google crawls with its smartphone agent and uses the mobile version of your content for ranking.

Google Search Central asks sites to put the same content on mobile as on desktop. If your mobile pages drop body text or hide tables, the missing parts may not be evaluated.

Users agree. In Japan's 2024 Communications Usage Trend Survey, 74.4% of individuals used a smartphone to go online, against 46.8% for a PC. B2B buyers also research suppliers on the move.

How to measure and thresholds

Open the site on a real phone first. Then check the following.

Check	Threshold	Basis
Body text size	Around 16px or more	Readable without zooming (common guideline)
Buttons and links	24×24 CSS pixels or more	WCAG 2.2, 2.5.8 (AA)
Horizontal scrolling	None in body content	Fits the screen width
Zoom	Not disabled	Avoid user-scalable=no
Content parity	Same body content as desktop	Google's mobile-first guidance

According to the Web Almanac 2024, about 16% of mobile sites disable zooming. People who cannot read small text then cannot reach the content at all.

When a partial fix is enough

If the template is responsive and only text size or button spacing falls short, CSS changes will do. If you run separate desktop and mobile sites, or tables and menus break on mobile and cannot be fixed, the structure itself needs rethinking.

3. Sign 2: The site is slow

Three Core Web Vitals thresholds

Speed is measured with Google's Core Web Vitals, judged at the 75th percentile of real-user data (the experience of the slowest quarter of visitors). INP replaced FID as a stable Core Web Vital in 2024.

The figure below shows the thresholds for all three metrics.

Metric	What it measures	Good	Poor
LCP (Largest Contentful Paint)	Time until the main content appears	2.5 s or less	Over 4.0 s
INP (Interaction to Next Paint)	How fast the page responds to clicks and taps	200 ms or less	Over 500 ms
CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift)	How much the layout jumps while loading	0.1 or less	Over 0.25

If all three are "good", speed is not a reason to redesign. If any one is "poor", it is worth finding the cause.

More than half of websites still fail

Slow sites are common. In the Web Almanac 2024, only 43% of sites on mobile and 54% on desktop had good scores on all three metrics.

On mobile, LCP (59%) is the most common failure. Oversized hero images, slow servers and render-blocking scripts are the usual causes.

Speed affects results

Fixing speed is not only about rankings. In web.dev's case studies, Vodafone (Italy) saw 8% more sales after a 31% LCP improvement in an A/B test. Japan's Rakuten 24 reported a 53.37% rise in revenue per visitor and a 33.13% rise in conversion rate on pages optimised for Core Web Vitals.

Google also says of page experience that "there is no single signal". Good Core Web Vitals do not guarantee rankings. Speed is best seen as a condition for keeping visitors from leaving.

When a partial fix is enough

If the cause is image size or a few scripts, fix in place. If layers of themes and plugins mean nothing makes it faster, or a page builder outputs huge amounts of code, rebuilding is faster and more reliable.

4. Sign 3: Your team cannot edit the site

Slow updates cost opportunities

This sign is easy to overlook but has a large business impact. Posting one news item needs an agency and takes a week. Changing a job listing comes with a quote. In that state, the site falls behind the business.

Measuring it is simple. For the past three months of updates, record days from request to publication and who did the work.

Situation	Verdict
Staff can change text and images the same day	Fine
Text is editable, but new pages need an agency	Often a partial fix (add page templates)
Even text changes need an agency	Review the foundation
Nobody can log in, or nobody knows who the admin is	Urgent; maintenance problems usually come with it

Common causes

Most cases have one of three causes: a static site with no CMS (content management system), a custom admin nobody dares touch, or a page builder where fixing one spot breaks the layout.

The third is the typical path to a site people are afraid to touch. In a redesign, decide who updates what, and how often, before the design, and pick a system that fits.

5. Sign 4: Maintenance and security are out of date

Software has support deadlines

Every piece of software that runs a site has a support deadline. After it passes, vulnerabilities no longer get fixed.

Taking WordPress as an example, WordPress.org recommends PHP 8.3 or newer. According to php.net, security support for PHP 8.2 ends on 31 December 2026, and PHP 8.1 already ended on 31 December 2025.

PHP version	Active support	Security support
8.1	Until 31 Dec 2023 (ended)	Until 31 Dec 2025 (ended)
8.2	Until 31 Dec 2024 (ended)	Until 31 Dec 2026
8.3	Until 31 Dec 2025 (ended)	Until 31 Dec 2027
8.4	Until 31 Dec 2026	Until 31 Dec 2028

Upgrading PHP can break old themes and plugins. Being unable to upgrade is itself a sign that a rebuild is due.

HTTPS moves from normal to required

In October 2025 Google announced that Chrome 154 (October 2026) turns on "Always Use Secure Connections" by default. Before the first visit to a public site without HTTPS, Chrome asks the user for permission.

Few sites lack HTTPS entirely now, but some still have pages or images served over HTTP. If certificates are renewed by hand and have expired more than once, review the whole maintenance setup.

Steps to check

1. In the admin panel or hosting panel, check the CMS, PHP and database versions
2. Check when themes and plugins were last updated (anything untouched for over a year needs attention)
3. Confirm in the contract or logs who handles updates and backups
4. Check that HTTPS certificates renew automatically

6. Sign 5: Results are unmeasured or falling

Is tracking still running?

You cannot judge results without working measurement. Google's old Universal Analytics stopped processing data on 1 July 2023, and access to the data was removed from July 2024. Sites that never moved to GA4 have been measuring nothing since.

Many GA4 setups also do not record form submissions as key events. Knowing visitor numbers without knowing how many enquired makes before-and-after comparison impossible.

How to measure and thresholds

Number	Where	Start thinking when
Enquiries	GA4 key events, form inbox	Not tracked, or down 30%+ year on year for several months
Enquiry rate	Enquiries ÷ visits	Almost none from key pages
Enquiry quality	Sales records	Most enquiries are irrelevant
High-exit pages	GA4 page report	Many exits on pricing or service pages

When numbers fall, the cause may lie outside the site: market changes, lower ad spend, seasonality. Rule those out first, then decide on a redesign.

Enquiry flow design itself is covered in How B2B enquiry flows differ between Japan and Europe.

7. Sign 6: The site is no longer found in search

Three numbers in Search Console

Check search traffic in Google Search Console. Look at three things.

Number	Where in Search Console	Start thinking when
Indexed pages	Page indexing	Key pages such as services are "not indexed"
Impressions and clicks	Performance	Sharply down year on year with no recovery
Core Web Vitals	Experience	Many URLs rated "poor"

What a redesign fixes, and what it doesn't

If the cause is page structure (no headings, no body text on mobile, many near-duplicate pages), a redesign fixes it.

If there is simply no page answering what people search for, write those pages first. A fresh design will not rank without content that answers the query.

A redesign can lower rankings too

A redesign can temporarily reduce search visibility. Google's site-move guidance tells you to expect temporary ranking fluctuation when URLs change.

Set server-side 301 or 308 permanent redirects from old to new URLs and keep them, generally, for at least a year. Update internal links to the new URLs. If you can keep URLs unchanged, that is the safest option.

8. Sign 7: Content lags behind the business

Appearance is the entry point to trust

In a Stanford study published in 2002, 46.1% of comments people made about a website's credibility mentioned its design or look. The study is over twenty years old, but the pattern still holds in day-to-day agency work: appearance is the first gate of trust.

The bigger problem, though, is content drift. Your main service has no page. A discontinued service is still listed. The contact person has left. Prices are years old. Each tells visitors that nobody looks after the site.

How to run an inventory

List every page in a spreadsheet and mark each one keep, update, merge or remove.

Verdict	Criterion	Example
Keep	Accurate and drives search or enquiries	Main service description
Update	Needed, but outdated	Prices, staff, case studies
Merge	Several pages say the same thing	Same notice split by year
Remove	Unrelated to the business, no traffic	Finished campaigns

If update or remove applies to more than 30% of pages, rethink the page structure. Under 30%, fixing those pages is enough. Redirect removed pages that have external links to a related page.

9. Sign 8: Accessibility falls short

The benchmark is WCAG 2.2 AA

The international standard for web accessibility (making sites usable by everyone, including people with disabilities) is W3C's WCAG 2.2. It became a Recommendation in October 2023, with an updated edition in December 2024, and added nine success criteria to 2.1.

For most small and medium-sized businesses, the practical target is level AA. Key criteria:

Success criterion	Requirement	Level
1.4.3 Contrast (Minimum)	Text contrast of at least 4.5:1 (3:1 for large text)	AA
1.1.1 Non-text Content	Alt text for images	A
2.5.8 Target Size (Minimum)	Tap targets at least 24×24 CSS pixels	AA (new in 2.2)
2.4.11 Focus Not Obscured	Keyboard focus is not hidden	AA (new in 2.2)
3.3.8 Accessible Authentication	Login without puzzles or memory tests	AA (new in 2.2)

Most sites do not meet it

WebAIM's February 2026 check of the top one million home pages found detectable WCAG failures on 95.9%, averaging 56.1 errors per page. The most common was low-contrast text (83.9%), followed by missing alt text (53.1%) and missing form labels (51%).

Automated checks catch only part of the problem. Whether you can reach and submit the contact form using only a keyboard has to be tested by hand.

The law is moving too

In the EU, the European Accessibility Act (EAA, Directive 2019/882) has applied since 28 June 2025. It covers consumer services such as online sales. In the Netherlands, e-commerce services report to the ACM (Autoriteit Consument & Markt, the consumer and markets authority).

Services provided by microenterprises, with fewer than 10 employees and annual turnover or balance sheet of €2 million or less, are exempt. Business-to-business-only sites are also mostly outside its scope.

In Japan, the amended Act on the Elimination of Discrimination against Persons with Disabilities took effect on 1 April 2024, turning "reasonable accommodation" by businesses from a duty to try into an obligation. It does not set web standards directly, but together with Japan's web accessibility standard JIS X 8341-3 it is a reason to act.

Item	Japan	EU (Netherlands)
Main law	Anti-discrimination act (amended April 2024)	European Accessibility Act (applies from June 2025)
Web standard	JIS X 8341-3 (equivalent to WCAG 2.0)	EN 301 549 (equivalent to WCAG 2.1 AA)
Duty for private sites	Reasonable accommodation on request	Covered services must meet requirements
Exempt	—	Microenterprise services, B2B-only services and others

10. Sign 9: Cookies and legal notices no longer meet the rules

The Dutch AP is checking cookie banners

For sites aimed at Europe, this sign has changed most in the past year or two. The Dutch Data Protection Authority, the AP (Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens), has systematically checked since April 2025 whether Dutch websites ask for consent to tracking cookies correctly.

According to the AP, it scans the cookie banners of 10,000 websites automatically, has warned more than 200 sites, and about three-quarters have fixed their banners. It is moving towards enforcement, including sanctions, against those that refuse. In an earlier case, the company behind Kruidvat.nl was fined €600,000 because consent boxes were pre-ticked.

How to measure

Open the site in a private window and, without clicking anything, check cookies and network requests in the developer tools.

Check	Problem
Cookies before consent	Ad or tracking cookies are set before any click
Reject button	Not on the first screen, only deep in settings
Defaults	Consent boxes pre-ticked
Visual weight	"Accept" stands out, "reject" is faint text
Withdrawal	No way to change consent later

The GDPR (EU General Data Protection Regulation) sets fines of up to €20 million or 4% of worldwide turnover, whichever is higher. Small businesses are unlikely to face that ceiling, but fixing before a warning is cheaper than fixing after one.

Sites aimed at Japan

In Japan, external transmission rules under the amended Telecommunications Business Act took effect on 16 June 2023. They cover news sites, social networks, search services and similar; a company's own product sales site is outside the scope. Media-type sites, however, must disclose what user information is sent to third parties.

Cookie rules are also covered in the enquiry flow article. For required notices on Dutch B2B sites (such as the KvK number), see Sections 8–9 of that article.

11. Sign 10: Foreign readers are not being reached

Is the language switch broken?

For companies working in both Japan and Europe, the multilingual setup matters. Check two things: does the language switch go to the same page in the other language, and do you tell search engines how the language versions relate?

Google asks sites to use hreflang when equivalent pages exist in other languages. English and Japanese pages must point to each other.

Check	Problem
Language switch	Switching sends you to the home page
hreflang	Missing, or only one side points to the other
English content	Literal translation, prices and conclusions buried
Update sync	Japanese is updated, English is years old

Structure, not translation

When English pages are literal translations, the problem is structure, not language. Japanese pages tend to explain step by step; European readers look for the conclusion and price range first. The enquiry flow article compares this in detail.

Multilingual sites easily end up with only one language being updated. If you have no way to keep both languages updated together, treat it as a form of Sign 3 (your team cannot edit the site).

12. Deadlines: what has changed in recent years

Deadlines set from outside

Some of the ten signs have deadlines set by others: search engines, browsers, laws and software support.

The timeline below lists the main changes of recent years. A site built a few years ago may not have been designed with these in mind.

When	Change	Related sign
June 2023	Japan's external transmission rules take effect	Sign 9
July 2023	Universal Analytics stops processing	Sign 5
October 2023	Mobile-first indexing complete	Sign 1
April 2024	Reasonable accommodation mandatory in Japan	Sign 8
June 2025	European Accessibility Act applies	Sign 8
October 2026	Chrome 154 makes HTTPS-first the default	Sign 4
December 2026	PHP 8.2 security support ends	Sign 4

A site built before 2022 without major work since has lived through almost every change in this table. Simply checking each one shows the likely scope of a redesign.

13. How many signs mean a full redesign?

Judge by number and type

Once you have checked the ten signs, count how many apply. As a guide:

Look at which signs, not just how many. Sign 3 (your team cannot edit the site) and Sign 4 (maintenance out of date) are foundation problems. If either applies, rebuilding the foundation often ends up cheaper even when few other signs apply.

Fix in place, phased rebuild, full redesign

Response	Scope	Typical duration	Suits
Fix in place	Images, CSS, some pages, settings	Days to a month	Sound foundation, local problems
Phased rebuild	Fix in priority order over months	2–6 months	Usable foundation, several problems
Full redesign	Structure, design, CMS, URLs	3–6 months or more	Foundation problems, or issues everywhere

In a phased rebuild, order matters. Generally fix legal and maintenance issues first (Signs 4 and 9), then measurement (Sign 5), then speed, mobile and content. Fixing measurement early lets you prove the effect of later work.

What a redesign won't fix

A full redesign does not fix having nobody to write content or no one responsible for updates. The new site will drift back to the same state within a few years. Always include the post-launch operating model (who, what, how often) in the plan.

14. Cost ranges and timelines

There are no official price figures

There are no official statistics on redesign costs. Prices vary widely by agency and country. The same "20-page company site" can differ several-fold depending on design depth, who writes the copy and whether it is multilingual.

The figures below are rough ranges to show how scope drives cost. Labour costs differ between Japan and Europe, so yen and euros are shown as separate market guides, not conversions.

Scope	Japan guide (JPY)	Europe guide (€)	Duration
Fixes (speed, mobile, some pages)	100k–800k	1,000–5,000	Days to a month
Small rebuild (up to 20 pages, one language)	800k–2.5m	5,000–15,000	2–3 months
Mid-size (20–100 pages, two languages)	2.5m–6m	15,000–40,000	3–6 months
Large (features, members, e-commerce)	6m+	40,000+	6 months+

What to check in a quote

When comparing prices, what is included matters more than the total. Cheaper quotes sometimes leave out the following.

Item	If missing
Redirects from old URLs	Search equity and backlinks are lost
Copywriting and content migration	Your team must supply copy for every page
Tracking setup (GA4, key events)	You cannot measure the redesign's effect
Cookie consent management	Rule breaches are flagged after launch
Accessibility checks	Rework is needed after launch
Post-launch maintenance	Updates and backups stop

When comparing, ask several agencies to quote on the same scope. Handing over the table from Section 1 and your self-check results makes the scope easier to align.

Grants may help

In Japan, grants such as the Small Business Sustainability Subsidy can sometimes cover website costs. Website spending is capped and cannot be claimed on its own, among other conditions. Conditions change with each round, so check the latest application guidelines before applying.

15. Typical redesign failures

Most failures happen at the planning stage

Redesigns tend to fail in planning and migration, not in design or code. Here are examples commonly seen in practice.

Failure	What happens	Prevention
Change all URLs without redirects	Search traffic drops sharply	List old URLs and set one-to-one 301s
Set up tracking after launch	No before-and-after comparison	Fix tracking before the redesign and keep the data
Only refresh the look	Numbers don't move	Measure the signs first, then set scope
Leave copy until last	Launch slips by months	Assign copy owners and deadlines first
Skip mobile testing	Main users struggle	Include real-device testing
Put the English version off	Only one language gets updated	Design both languages together

The "rebuild everything" myth

Another common pattern is trying to solve every sign at once until the scope balloons and requirements are outdated by launch. Narrow the scope and add in phases after launch; it is faster and safer.

16. Example cases (fictional)

The following are fictional examples to show the reasoning. They are not real companies.

Case A: Japanese manufacturer, company site built seven years ago

A site of about 20 pages built with a page builder seven years ago. The self-check found Sign 2 (LCP 4.8 s), Sign 3 (even text changes go to the agency), Sign 4 (PHP 8.1), Sign 5 (never moved to GA4) and Sign 7 (no page for the main product): five signs.

By count alone this is a phased rebuild, but both Signs 3 and 4 apply. Upgrading PHP will probably break the page builder, and repeated fixes will add up. Here, a full redesign that keeps URLs wherever possible is the sound choice.

Case B: Japanese-owned service company in the Netherlands, bilingual site built three years ago

A Japanese-English site built three years ago, with the CMS kept up to date. Two signs applied: Sign 9 (ad tags fire before consent) and Sign 10 (the language switch goes to the home page).

The foundation is sound, so fixing in place is enough. Reconfiguring consent management and fixing hreflang and the language switch can be done within a month.

Case C: Japanese retailer selling online to EU consumers

The company sells to EU consumers from Japan and has 30 employees. Speed and mobile are good, but Sign 8 (low contrast, unlabelled form fields) and Sign 9 apply.

It is not a microenterprise, so the European Accessibility Act is likely to apply. A realistic plan is to fix colours, forms and keyboard use in phases without a major visual redesign.

Case	Signs found	Decision
A: Japanese manufacturer	2, 3, 4, 5, 7 (five, incl. foundation)	Full redesign (keep URLs)
B: Japanese-owned firm in NL	9, 10 (two)	Fix in place
C: Japanese retailer selling to EU	8, 9 (two, high legal impact)	Phased rebuild (accessibility first)

17. Where Japan and Europe weigh the signs differently

Same signs, different weight

The ten signs are the same in Japan and Europe, but priorities differ by market, especially for signs tied to law.

Sign	Sites aimed at Japan	Sites aimed at Europe
8. Accessibility	More important since accommodation became mandatory	EAA requirements for consumer services
9. Cookies and notices	External transmission rules (media sites), privacy policy	AP checks; tracking before consent may breach rules
10. Languages	Minor if there is no foreign audience	English assumed; local languages in some countries
7. Content	Company profile table and history build trust	Named staff, case studies and price ranges drive decisions

For sites aimed at both Japan and Europe, building to the stricter standard is usually more efficient. A site that meets European cookie and accessibility standards will not run into trouble in Japan.

18. What to do tomorrow: a 30-minute self-check

Steps

Before deciding on a redesign, turn the current state into numbers. This takes about 30 minutes.

1. Open it on a phone (5 min): open the home page, a service page and the contact form on a real phone; check that you can read without zooming and tap with a finger
2. Run PageSpeed Insights (5 min): enter your three main URLs and note LCP, INP and CLS
3. Check Search Console (5 min): look at "not indexed" pages and year-on-year performance
4. Check GA4 (5 min): confirm enquiries are recorded as key events
5. Check the admin panel (5 min): note CMS and PHP versions and plugin update dates
6. Check cookies (5 min): open a private window and confirm a reject button is on the first screen

Summarise the results

Record the results in the Section 1 table, marking each sign as applying or not and adding the numbers. You can hand this table straight to an agency. Coming with numbers aligns proposals and quotes, so they are easier to compare.

19. Checklist

Mobile and speed

• Body text is readable on a phone without zooming
• Buttons and links are at least 24×24 CSS pixels
• LCP 2.5 s or less, INP 200 ms or less, CLS 0.1 or less

Editing and maintenance

• Staff can change text and images the same day
• CMS and PHP are on supported versions
• HTTPS certificates renew automatically
• Backups have an owner and a schedule

Tracking, search and content

• GA4 records enquiries as key events
• Key pages are indexed in Search Console
• Less than 30% of pages are outdated

Law and languages

• Text contrast is at least 4.5:1
• The contact form can be reached and submitted by keyboard alone
• No ad or tracking cookies are set before consent
• A reject button is on the first screen
• The language switch goes to the same page, and hreflang points both ways

Summary

• Decide on a redesign with ten measurable signs, not age or looks
• Zero to two signs: fix in place. Three to five: phased rebuild. Six or more: full redesign
• Signs 3 (cannot edit) and 4 (out of support) are foundation problems; if either applies, consider rebuilding
• Measure speed with Core Web Vitals (LCP 2.5 s, INP 200 ms, CLS 0.1). Only 43% of sites pass all three on mobile
• Aim for WCAG 2.2 AA. The European Accessibility Act has applied in the EU since June 2025, and reasonable accommodation is now mandatory in Japan
• The Dutch AP has been checking cookie banners since April 2025. Fix tracking before consent first
• If URLs change, keep 301 redirects for at least a year. Compare costs with quotes for the same scope

Sources

Search and speed (Google)

• Web Vitals — web.dev: the three Core Web Vitals, thresholds, 75th percentile
• Understanding page experience in Google Search results — Google Search Central: "there is no single signal"
• Mobile-first indexing best practices — Google Search Central: same content on mobile and desktop
• Mobile-first indexing has landed — Google Search Central Blog: completion announced on 31 October 2023
• Site moves with URL changes — Google Search Central: 301/308 redirects, keep at least a year, temporary fluctuation
• Tell Google about localized versions of your page — Google Search Central: hreflang
• PageSpeed Insights — Google: speed testing
• Vodafone: A 31% improvement in LCP increased sales by 8% — web.dev: LCP and sales
• Rakuten 24's investment in Core Web Vitals — web.dev: revenue per visitor +53.37%, conversion rate +33.13%
• HTTPS by default — Google Online Security Blog: Chrome 154 enables "Always Use Secure Connections" by default
• Universal Analytics has been replaced by Google Analytics 4 — Google Analytics Help: processing stopped 1 July 2023, data access removed from July 2024

Research and statistics

• Web Almanac 2024: Performance — HTTP Archive: Core Web Vitals pass rates (43% mobile, 54% desktop)
• Web Almanac 2024: Accessibility — HTTP Archive: sites disabling zoom, contrast pass rates
• The WebAIM Million — WebAIM: February 2026, failures detected on 95.9% of the top million home pages
• 2024 Communications Usage Trend Survey — Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (Japan): devices used to go online (smartphone 74.4%, PC 46.8%)
• How Do People Evaluate a Web Site's Credibility? — Consumer Reports WebWatch / Stanford: 46.1% of credibility comments mentioned design (2002)

Software maintenance

• Supported Versions — PHP: PHP support deadlines
• Requirements — WordPress.org: PHP 8.3 or newer recommended

Accessibility

• Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 — W3C: success criteria, contrast, target size
• Directive (EU) 2019/882 — EUR-Lex: the European Accessibility Act
• European Accessibility Act for products and services — business.gov.nl (RVO): covered services, microenterprise exemption, ACM notification
• Amended Act on the Elimination of Disability Discrimination takes effect — Cabinet Office (Japan): reasonable accommodation mandatory from 1 April 2024

Cookies and personal data

• AP pakt misleidende cookiebanners aan — Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens: systematic cookie banner checks
• AP: Three-quarters of websites have adjusted their misleading cookie banners after warning — Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens: 200+ warnings, about three-quarters fixed
• Boete van 600.000 euro voor tracking cookies op Kruidvat.nl — Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens: fine over pre-ticked consent
• Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (GDPR) — EUR-Lex: maximum fines (Article 83)
• External transmission rules — Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (Japan): scope of Japan's rules

All sources were checked on 21 October 2026. Legal requirements depend on your business model and tools change, so check the latest guidance before acting. The decision guide in Section 13 and the cost ranges in Section 14 reflect agency practice, not statistics.