How Browser Caching Makes Websites Load Faster on Repeat Visits
When you visit a website, your browser downloads resources like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and images to display the page. On subsequent visits or refreshes, the browser can reuse locally stored copies of these resources instead of re-downloading them, speeding up load times. Servers control caching behaviour through HTTP response headers such as Cache-Control, which specifies how long a resource remains valid. The ETag mechanism allows the browser to check with the server whether a cached file has changed, receiving either a '304 Not Modified' response or a fresh download. A standard refresh follows normal cache rules, while a hard reload (Ctrl+Shift+R) forces the browser to bypass cached resources — useful when developers push updated files.
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