Why a Bloated wp_options Autoload Set Slows Down Every WordPress Request

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Every WordPress site stores its settings in the wp_options table, where each row has an autoload flag. Rows marked for autoload are read in a single query at the start of every request, even when that request does not need them. On a small test blog, 188 of 215 rows, about 48 KB of values, were loaded up front, which the author considers harmless at that scale. Since WordPress 6.6, the platform has introduced additional autoload values and skips options larger than 150,000 bytes unless a plugin explicitly requests autoload. The largest autoloaded entries on this blog were core items, such as a block CSS transient and the rewrite rules, that have a clear reason to be loaded on each request.

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ProgrammingDEV Community ·

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