Very roughly:
I notice the acabado page source is 403 lines with 15 “<script” tags, and 26 “src=” tags.
Kadence page source is 543 lines, 22 “<script” tags, 16 “src=” tags.
PAGESPEED – MOBILE MODE
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwp.brenden.com%2F
3 reloads: score 17, 24, 23
3 more reloads: score 20, 23, 27
This is ‘measuring’ 1/3rd the score, but it doesn’t feel 3x slower.
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwp2.brenden.com
3 reloads: score 74, 72, 74
3 more reloads: score 74, 74, 75
This ‘measures’ triple the score but does not feel 3x faster.
Evaluating the ‘blog’ page also shows big disparity in pagespeed score, but feel is not that different.
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwp.brenden.com%2Fblog
3 reloads: score 15, 26, 28
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwp2.brenden.com%2Fblog
3 reloads: score 72, 74, 74
PAGESPEED – DESKTOP MODE
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwp.brenden.com%2Fblog&tab=desktop
scores: 69, 62, 59
https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwp2.brenden.com%2Fblog&tab=desktop
scores: 92, 92, 91
To me, it looks like Acabado draws the black backgrounds quickly but then the words are annoyingly slow to appear. Kadence seems to pop the words up quickly. Acabado ‘measures’ triple scores on google pagespeed (vs Kadence), but it does not feel much (if any) faster than Kadence.