Reply To: Critical Performance Issue (16s+ TTFB) on Variable Product Pages with High Varia

URGENT UPDATE: Critical 37-second TTFB on Shop/Archive Page

Hi WoodMart Support Team,

I am updating my existing ticket with critical new information. Please disregard my previous comments about the shop page being “fast.”

I have just run a WebPageTest on my main shop/archive page, and the results are definitive.

Test Results (First View / Uncached):

Time to First Byte (TTFB): 37.213 seconds

Result: The test failed with an “Error: Timed Out”.

Test Results (Repeat View / Cached):

TTFB: 0.438 seconds (This is fast, showing the LiteSpeed cache is working).

What This Proves:

This is the “smoking gun.” The 37-second uncached TTFB proves that the WoodMart theme is processing all ~800 variations for every single product on the archive grid before the server can build and send the page.

I previously enabled the “Limit swatches in grid = 1” setting, and this made the cached page feel fast. However, this new test proves that setting is only a visual optimization and does NOT stop the theme from doing the heavy 37-second server-side processing on an uncached “first view”.

This is the same root problem as my 16-second TTFB on the single product page, but it’s even worse on the archive page.

My Question:

How can I stop the WoodMart theme from processing all product variations on the server just to load the shop/archive page? This is a critical performance issue that makes the site unusable for any new visitor (or when the cache expires).

Is there a PHP filter, a hidden setting, or any other solution to completely disable this server-side variation processing on archive pages?

Thank you.