How to make a slow browser go fast

internetsafariweb-browserweb-browsing

I've had my MacBook Air for about six months. Now all the browsers are extremely sluggish — sometimes taking minutes to load a web page that would have used to take under one second to load back when everything was new.

Questions

  1. What's causing the sluggish browser response? (Most likely.)
  2. What is a stepwise procedure to troubleshoot and/or fix it?

Configuration Details

  • O/S: OS X Yosemite 10.10.5
  • Memory: 4 GB @ 1600MHz DDR
  • Browsers: Safari, Chrome

Best Answer

Changing my DNS settings to Google's DNS servers 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 seems to help a little but might not be the comprehensive solution I was looking for.

Procedure

Bottom toolbar > System Preferences > Network > Advanced... > DNS > + > 8.8.8.8 > + > 8.8.4.4

Or, via command line:

networksetup -setdnsservers Wi-Fi 8.8.8.8 8.8.4.4

The procedure is detailed here.