Enabling Views caching (time-based or tag-based)for Drupal 8 , 9 , 10 , and 11

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8.x , 9.x , 10.x , 11.x

In our previous lesson, we delved into enhancing your Drupal site's performance by integrating a Content Delivery Network (CDN). With assets distributed globally, we achieved reduced latency and improved reliability. Now, let's advance our optimization journey by focusing on caching mechanisms within Drupal, specifically Views caching.

Understanding Views Caching

Views caching is a powerful technique to reduce the load on your server by storing and reusing query results for a defined period or based on certain conditions. This means that instead of running the same database queries every time a page is loaded, Drupal can deliver cached content, which significantly improves page load times.

Types of Views Caching

There are two primary types of caching you can enable for Views in Drupal: Time-based caching and Tag-based caching. Each serves a unique purpose and can be selected based on your website's needs.

1. Time-Based Caching

Time-based caching allows you to set a specific duration for which the cached data remains valid. Once the time elapses, the cache is refreshed in the next request with the latest data available.

Example: Suppose you have a website section displaying the top 10 latest articles. If these updates are frequent but not on every page reload, you might set a cache duration of 10 minutes. This means the query result is reused from the cache for any request within these 10 minutes, minimizing resource consumption.

How to Enable Time-Based Caching in Views:

  1. Navigate to Structure > Views, and select the View you wish to cache.
  2. Click on Advanced in the View editor, then under Caching, click to edit.
  3. Select Time-based caching from the options.
  4. Set the cache duration in seconds. For example, if you set it to 600, the cache will last for 10 minutes.
  5. Save the View and clear the cache to apply changes.

2. Tag-Based Caching

Tag-based caching invalidates the cache based on specific conditions or events, like content updates. This is particularly useful for dynamic content that should update in real-time upon changes.

Example: In a community forum where users frequently update their profiles and discussions, tag-based caching ensures that changes reflect immediately without significant delays.

How to Enable Tag-Based Caching in Views:

  1. Go to Structure > Views and locate the View for caching.
  2. Access the Advanced tab again, and under Caching, select Tag-based.
  3. Assign cache tags that will trigger cache clearing upon related content changes. Tags might include content types, node updates, or custom tags.
  4. Save your settings and clear the cache to ensure new configurations are live.

Conclusion

Enabling Views caching significantly reduces server load and improves user experience by delivering content faster. By selecting caching strategies that align with your data and update frequency, you can fine-tune performance optimization efforts in Drupal efficiently.

What's Next?

For our next lesson, we will explore how to refine Views queries by reducing unnecessary fields and filters. This will not only make your queries more efficient but also further enhance your site's performance. Stay tuned!