Google AMP or Accelerated Mobile Pages is a new project started by Google to accelerate the loading time of web pages.

Let’s take a deeper look into AMP:

What is Google AMP?

AMP is an open source project. AMP pages are the lighter versions of actual web pages. Since they are lighter, loading them is pretty easy thus accelerating the loading time. AMP pages not only lighter but their coding aspects are also restricted. They are 15-85 % faster than the traditional HTML pages.

In other words, AMP is the optimized version of the normal websites, which also helps the AMP site to get better SEO ranks due its smaller size and accelerated load time. It’s mobile as well.

How Does Google AMP Work?

Unlike the HTML code, JS is used in AMP. AMP allows the browser to load the important or priority content or pictures before the normal ones and based on the current view.

How Are Google AMP Pages Built?

There are three components in AMP’s core.

AMP HTML: The pages are coded in AMP HTML, a kind of simplified HTML with few or no tags.
AMP JS: The ultra-fast libraries of JS are used to improve the speeds.
AMP Cache: cache can sometimes be stored in Google servers or even on your device (if you open it frequently) and will be loaded from there instead of loading from the main memory.

Pros of Google AMP

Faster load time. Attracting new visitors.
Decreased bounce rate.
Better visibility on the SERP which increases the click rate on the SERP.
Much better SEO rank due to faster load times.
It’s available in all formats. i.e for commercials paid search.

Cons of Google AMP

Most parts of coding are restricted, i.e in JS and HTML.
Due to restrictions, AMP is difficult to implement.
Most of the plugins must be ignored or omitted.
It is not compatible with all the devices.
It can only be implemented in the online advertising industry.

Why Use Google AMP and When?

You can AMP for achieving the following goals.

Appear in the Google Top Stories.
Offer an optimal version for pages with great editorial content.

Since editorial is less on the coding side and more on content you can implement AMP with ease.

If you have access to Google new as an editor your site will be shown first in the search results.

If you are not into editorial you can use AMP as well.

You can do the following things using AMP:

Having a responsive website for desktop, mobile, and tablet and an AMP version for Google mobile search results.
Having a website for desktop and an AMP version for mobiles.
Having a responsive website for desktop, mobile, and tablets.

As long as your mobile website is responsive enough we can implement AMP no issues there!

You can WordPress plugins for AMP which is available.

Setup Google WordPress AMP Plugin

It’s pretty simple. Download the AMP for WP then activate the plugin.

Go to Plugins → Add New → search for “AMP for WordPress” → click Install Now button and then, activate the plugin.

Later it’s all elementary stuff. Same as other plugins you can see the renderings for mobiles and desktops and much more. You can access it all through the dashboard.

Google AMP SEO

Here is the canonical URL for the source code.

Validate Your AMP Page

Use the following link for validating your AMP Page.

VALIDATE

Then insert your URL there and you are done.

Customize WordPress AMP Pages

To be honest you can’t really customize the AMP page without the help of yoast SEO and use glue for both Yoast SEO and AMP. This will give you the ability to do a lot customization.

And What’s Next?

AMP is mainly used to enhance the performance of the web pages. But currently, it’s kinda limited.

But in near future, the algorithms for AMP may perform better than ever before. Taking performance to peaks.

Due to that everyone would update their normal website to AMP.

In other words, AMP can change the future. Given that Google never disappoints.