Our Server Stack for Faster Elementor Sites

We’ve used Elementor plenty of times, and we get the appeal—it’s easy to use, great for quick page builds, and super flexible for most users. But the truth is, it’s not the lightest tool in the shed. It can really slow things down if you don’t have the right setup behind it. That’s one of the reasons we don’t use it for every project. When we do, it’s because it makes sense for the client—and when that happens, we make sure everything under the hood is ready to support it.

Over the years, we’ve worked with a lot of Elementor sites—some we built ourselves, others we inherited—and performance issues are one of the most common headaches we’ve had to fix. Beautiful sites paired with sluggish load times are a classic combo we’ve seen more than we’d like. That’s why we’ve built a go-to tech stack that keeps Elementor sites fast, secure, and running smooth.

If you’re using Cloudways, you’re already ahead of the game—that’s a solid platform. But if you want full control and a little more horsepower under the hood, here’s exactly how we configure our stack.

Dedicated Cloud Hosting – We Stick With DigitalOcean

We prefer DigitalOcean because we’re familiar with it, it’s reliable, and it gives us total control. Simple as that.

We typically spin up a droplet (virtual server) with:

• Ubuntu 22.04 LTS (or w/e is the current version)
• At least 2 vCPUs and 4GB RAM for smaller sites
• Bigger sites get 4+ vCPUs and 8GB+ RAM depending on traffic

Need more storage? We attach DigitalOcean Volumes and even move MySQL databases there for clients with massive datasets. It helps isolate heavy database workloads and keeps everything running fast.

Server Config – Nginx + Redis = Speed

We don’t mess with Apache. Nginx is our go-to web server. It’s faster and handles high concurrency way better.

We also set up:

• Redis for object caching
• PHP-FPM tuned for the site’s load
• MariaDB or MySQL, depending on client preference
• Real cron jobs (none of that wp-cron nonsense)

One thing worth pointing out—when you have Redis, WP Rocket, Elementor's internal cache, and Cloudflare all involved, you’ve got to be mindful of cache layers. Clearing one isn’t enough. You need to clear them in the right order: Redis > Elementor > WP Rocket (or whatever page cache you’re using) > Cloudflare. That sequence avoids a ton of weird issues and keeps everything running properly.

Caching & Speed Plugins

We use WP Rocket on every site. Yes, it’s paid. Yes, it’s worth it.

It handles:

• Page caching
• Minification
• Lazy loading
• Database cleanup
• Preloading

And because Redis is doing the heavy lifting for object caching, WP Rocket can focus on the rest. They play well together.

We also enable GZIP or Brotli compression depending on what’s supported, and disable things like emojis, embeds, and other WordPress fluff no one actually needs.

People often ask us about LiteSpeed Cache, but it requires a LiteSpeed server—and we’ve had stability issues with that in the past. It’s not worth the trade-off for us, so we stick with what works reliably.

Cloudflare – Not Just for DNS

Cloudflare isn’t just for speeding up your DNS (though it’s great at that too). We set it up for every Elementor site because it adds an extra performance and security layer.

Here’s what we configure:

• Recommended WordPress settings from Cloudflare
• Geo-blocking: We block entire regions that don’t matter for our business. No need for random traffic from halfway across the world eating up server resources.
• Firewall rules and rate limiting to keep bad bots out

If you want to get extra fancy, APO (Automatic Platform Optimization) can help too.

Security – Yes, We Use Wordfence (Even Though It Slows Things Down)

We’ve tested just about every WordPress security plugin. And even though Wordfence does add some overhead, we still use it.

Here’s how we minimize the performance hit:

• Tweak scan schedules (off-peak hours only)
• Disable live traffic unless absolutely needed
• Use Cloudflare’s firewall first, so Wordfence doesn’t have to do all the heavy lifting

It’s not perfect, but it gives us peace of mind. And when paired with a properly optimized stack, the slowdown is minimal and manageable.

Other Tuning & Best Practices

A few more things we always do:

• Always run the latest stable PHP version
• Keep plugin count low—Elementor already eats enough resources
• Tune MySQL settings (key buffer, query cache, etc.)
• Regular database optimization (clean out transients, revisions, etc.)

And we monitor performance closely using tools like Query Monitor and New Relic, especially on complex sites.