Ottawa Small Business Website Speed Report 2026

We audited 91 Ottawa service business websites for mobile speed using Google PageSpeed Insights. The results were worse than expected.

Published March 29, 2026 by Siraj Ahmadzai, PeakSpire

66.4
Average Score

60%
Below 70

89%
Below 90

11%
Score 90+

Google recommends a PageSpeed score of 90 or higher for a good mobile experience. Only 11% of Ottawa service businesses meet that bar. The average site scores 66.4, which puts it in the orange zone: not terrible, but slow enough that Google deprioritizes it in local search results and over half of mobile visitors leave before the page finishes loading.

Why This Matters for Ottawa Service Businesses

When someone searches “plumber near me” or “roofing company Ottawa,” Google factors in your website speed as a ranking signal. A slow site does two things wrong at once: it drops you lower in search results, and when visitors do find you, 53% of them leave if your mobile page takes longer than 3 seconds to load (Google research).

For service businesses that depend on phone calls and form submissions, a slow website is a silent revenue leak. You are paying for advertising, Google Maps visibility, and word-of-mouth referrals, and then losing those visitors at the last step because your site takes too long to load.

Score Distribution: Where Ottawa Sites Fall

0-29
1

1 site (1.1%)

30-49
11

11 sites (12.1%)

50-69
43

43 sites (47.3%) – largest group

70-89
26

26 sites (28.6%)

90-100
10

10 sites (11.0%)

Nearly half of all sites (47.3%) land in the 50-69 range. These are the “orange zone” sites that technically load but feel noticeably slow on mobile. Combined with the 13.2% in the red zone (below 50), that means 6 out of 10 Ottawa service business websites fail Google’s speed threshold.

Histogram showing Ottawa service business website speed score distribution. 43 sites score 50-69, 26 score 70-89, 11 score 30-49, 10 score 90-100, 1 scores below 30.

Speed by Industry

We broke the data down by vertical to see which industries perform best and worst. Some patterns were surprising.

Electrician
74.8

74.8

Pest Control
71.0

71.0

HVAC
69.9

69.9

Plumbing
68.9

68.9

Landscaping
67.2

67.2

Roofing
65.6

65.6

Cleaning
62.6

62.6

Tree Service
62.2

62.2

Painting
61.4

61.4

Window Cleaning
59.4

59.4

Electricians lead the pack at 74.8, likely because many electrician sites use simpler templates with fewer heavy images. Window cleaning companies are the slowest at 59.4, possibly due to image-heavy portfolios of before/after shots that are not optimized for mobile.

Every single vertical averages below 75. Not one industry in Ottawa’s service sector is consistently delivering a fast mobile experience.

Horizontal bar chart showing average mobile PageSpeed scores by Ottawa service industry. Electricians lead at 74.8, window cleaning lowest at 59.4. All industries average below 75.

Key Findings

1
60% of Ottawa service business websites score below 70 on mobile. These sites are actively losing visitors to slow load times. Google’s own data shows 53% of mobile users abandon sites that take over 3 seconds.
2
The average score is 66.4/100. Google considers anything below 50 “poor” and below 90 “needs improvement.” The typical Ottawa service business site sits squarely in “needs improvement” territory.
3
Only 11% of sites score 90 or above. That means 89% of Ottawa service businesses have room for meaningful speed improvement. For most, the fix is technical (image optimization, unused JavaScript removal, font loading strategy), not a redesign.
4
17% of sites were completely unreachable. 19 out of 112 domains returned no response at all. Expired domains, misconfigured servers, or abandoned websites. These businesses are invisible online.
5
Window cleaning and painting companies have the slowest sites. Both average under 62. These verticals rely heavily on visual portfolios (before/after photos) that are rarely optimized for mobile delivery.
6
The gap between best and worst is massive. Some sites score 100 (perfect), while the worst scores 20. In competitive local search, that speed gap translates directly to ranking differences and lost calls.

What Slows Down Ottawa Service Sites

After working with local businesses on speed optimization (including taking a local Ottawa company from 54 to a perfect 100), the same culprits show up repeatedly:

The good news: every one of these is fixable without redesigning your site. A focused speed optimization sprint typically resolves 80% of the issues in 5-7 business days.

Want to know your site’s real speed score?

Run a free audit on your site. No sign-up required. Takes 30 seconds.

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Methodology

  • Tool: Google PageSpeed Insights v5 API (mobile strategy)
  • Sample: 112 Ottawa-based service businesses across 10 verticals
  • Verticals: Electrician, plumbing, HVAC, roofing, landscaping, cleaning, tree service, painting, window cleaning, pest control
  • Scoring: Lighthouse Performance score (0-100), which factors in First Contentful Paint, Largest Contentful Paint, Total Blocking Time, Cumulative Layout Shift, and Speed Index
  • Collection period: March 2026
  • Exclusions: 19 sites returned no response (expired domains, server errors) and 2 returned no valid score. 91 sites included in final analysis.
  • Note: Scores can vary by 3-5 points between runs due to network conditions and server load. One measurement per site was taken.

How PeakSpire Can Help

We specialize in making Ottawa service business websites fast. Our Speed Sprint is a focused 5-7 day optimization engagement that typically takes sites from the orange zone (50-70) to green (90+).

Our benchmark: we took WindowGuru, an Ottawa window cleaning company, from a PageSpeed score of 54 to a perfect 100. Every page. Desktop and mobile. That is not a theoretical number. You can run the test yourself.

Free. No strings.

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Our free audit tool tests your site the same way Google does. See your real scores, your bottlenecks, and what to fix first.

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