As a result of the digital transformation, many companies are giving consumers the opportunity to use the internet for activities that were previously done offline, so the possibilities and functions of websites are constantly changing and expanding. A large part of the interaction already takes place on the companies’ websites: the customer chooses the products, frequently makes the purchase, and also contacts the customer service via the websites. This has led to a five-fold increase in the size of websites on desktops and more than ten-fold increase in the size of websites on mobile devices in the last 10 years, and a corresponding increase in traffic. These two factors have an impact on the carbon footprint of websites. Find out how!
Thanks to the ever-increasing digitalization, corporate websites are becoming more and more functional, adapting to the needs of customers. In 2010, digitalization was most common in large foreign-owned companies, but with the 2020 pandemic reducing the need for face-to-face interactions, more and more market players are choosing to communicate with their partners through new channels, building trust and increasing sales. Digital transformation has brought a range of features to websites, from personalized content, automated processes and advanced user interfaces to analytics, data collection and chatbots. Whether it’s opening an account, taking out a loan or shopping online—even in places where you could only get products by picking it up in person—most interactions have now moved to websites, increasing their traffic, size and carbon footprint.
Traffic
Digital tools, platforms and apps allow companies to automate and digitalize processes that contribute to efficiency, reduce costs and improve customer relationships. Digital transformation enables companies to discover new business models, new marketing methods, while being more responsive to their customers’ needs, thus significantly increasing the traffic to their websites. However, the number of visitors to a website also depends on the size of the company, its industry, the market environment, and the level of digital transformation—not all companies are achieving the same growth.
Size and carbon footprint
Increasingly complex functionality means that more information, images, video, and resources are needed to tailor websites to users’ needs. The digital transformation has led to a nearly five-fold increase in the size of websites accessed from desktop computers between 2010 and 2023:
- In 2010, the average was only 467.7 KB, while
- by early 2023, this value had jumped to 2286.3 KB. (measured on February 7, 2023)
And the size of web pages opened on mobile devices increased by more than tenfold:
As websites have grown in size, their impact on the environment has also changed. The bigger a website is, the more images, videos and other elements it includes, the more carbon it emits. In addition to the carbon footprint, the size of websites also affects user experience, page load speed, mobile search efficiency and web hosting costs.
How? Find out in our next article! Subscribe to our newsletter to make sure you don’t miss it!
