# Optimizing Magento for performance

> Make Magento run faster on your hosting with cron jobs, caching, flat catalogs, log tuning and other recommended optimisations.

Source: https://helpcenter.ruachost.com/apps/magento/optimizing-magento-for-performance/

Magento is a **resource‑intensive application**, and without proper tuning it can run slowly on standard shared hosting. On **ruachost.com**, you can apply several optimizations to improve speed, responsiveness, and scalability.

## Server Requirements

- Minimum **16GB RAM** recommended; **32GB RAM** for large stores.
- Use a **Managed VPS** for best results.
- Shared hosting accounts are not sufficient for full Magento deployments.

## Key Optimization Steps

### 1. Configure Cron Jobs

- By default, Magento cron runs every 15 minutes.
- This can cause unnecessary load.
- Adjust cron frequency to reduce performance impact.

### 2. Optimize Logging

- Magento’s default log settings can cause databases to grow very large.
- Clean log tables regularly to reduce database size.

### 3. Enable Caching

- Magento includes several built‑in caches.
- Go to **System → Cache Management** and ensure all caches are **Enabled**.

### 4. Disable Local Modules (Magento 1.9 only)

- If `app/code/local` is empty, disable local modules in `app/etc/local.xml`:

  ```
  <disable_local_modules>true</disable_local_modules>
  ```

### 5. Apache Optimizations

- Enable **mod_deflate** for compression.
- Enable **mod_expires** for browser caching.
- Merge and minify **JavaScript** and **CSS** files.

### 6. Use Flat Catalogs

- Flat catalogs merge product and category data into single tables.
- This reduces complex SQL queries and improves database performance.

### 7. Eliminate 404 Errors

- Ensure your store does not contain links to nonexistent resources.
- Each 404 triggers Magento, increasing CPU load.

### 8. Disable Unused Module Output

- Go to **Stores → Configuration → Advanced → Advanced**.
- Disable output for unused modules to reduce overhead.

### 9. Developer Debugging (Magento 1.9 only)

- Ensure debugging options are disabled in production.
- Profiler and logging should be set to **No**.

## Important Notes

- Always back up your site before applying performance changes.
- Test optimizations in a **staging environment** before production.
- Ruachost Managed VPS accounts support advanced caching (Redis, Memcached, LiteMage).