The State of Web Vitals

Speculation eagerness

How eager the winning speculation rule is, from conservative to immediate.

Field data PhoneDesktopAll Scope All sites Q1 2026 edition · Desktop field outcomes
Metric LCP INP CLS
1

At a glance the headline numbers for Speculation eagerness

How eager the winning speculation rule is, from conservative to immediate.

5
Categories
94,890 sites
65.0%
Top share
none
0.03
Top CLS
Median for none

0.6% of sites speculate on hover. 31.5% wait for the press.

The State of Web Vitals · Q1 2026 · 94,910 sites · desktop field datacorewebvitals.io/state-of-cwv
2

Speculation eagerness who uses what, and how stable each group is

Median CLS
0
0.05
0.10
0.15
0.20
0.25
eager0.013% of sites
none0.0365% of sites
conservative0.0332% of sites
moderate0.031% of sites
immediate0.030% of sites
VariantShare of sitesMedian
eager 2,693 sites
3%
0.01
none 61,678 sites
65%
0.03
conservative 29,881 sites
32%
0.03
moderate 564 sites
1%
0.03
immediate 74 sites
0%
0.03

Little daylight between the groups: every variant sits near 0.01 median CLS. computed

The State of Web Vitals · Q1 2026 · 94,910 sites · desktop field datacorewebvitals.io/state-of-cwv
3

Passing CLS per speculation eagerness which group passes the CLS most often

VariantSitesPassing CLSCLS
Eager 2.8% 2,693 96% 0.01
Moderate 0.6% 564 79% 0.03
Conservative 31.5% 29,881 78% 0.03
None 65% 61,678 78% 0.03
Immediate 0.1% 74 64% 0.03
Good Needs Improvement Poor Sorted best-passing first · median colored by its own rating · pass = good CLS (0.1 at p75) · one value per site

96% of Eager sites pass CLS. None trails 18 points behind. computed

The State of Web Vitals · Q1 2026 · 94,910 sites · desktop field datacorewebvitals.io/state-of-cwv
4

Why this matters for the Core Web Vitals, and where to start fixing it

Eagerness is the trigger: when speculation starts. Conservative waits for the press, the moment between pointer-down and the completed click. Moderate starts on hover. Eager and immediate speculate before any signal, trading wasted loads for a longer head start.

Conservative is close to free: it only speculates on links the visitor is touching, and the press-to-click gap is head start nobody misses. Turn eagerness up only where the next click is predictable, like a paginated flow or a checkout funnel.

How does this affect the Core Web Vitals?

Speculation eagerness correlates with the CLS. With Eager, 96% of sites pass the CLS. With Conservative, 78% do. The causal link is weak: the choice mostly marks what kind of site made it.

Go fix it Speculation rules → The prerender-until-script speculation rule →
Related signals Speculation posture → Chrome field data from 94,910 sites, representing millions of real page loads · How we measured