Designing for mobile data: how Buntu keeps its shop fast on every connection

Most of our customers shop on a phone and a prepaid bundle. A Buntu spokesperson explains what that means for how the shop is built.

The large majority of visits to Buntu come from mobile phones, and many of them come over prepaid mobile data. That shapes almost every technical decision behind the shop, from how product photographs are prepared to which features are built at all. In this Q&A, a Buntu spokesperson discusses performance, data costs and the trade-offs involved.

Why is page weight such a priority for Buntu?

"For many of our customers, every megabyte they use comes out of a data bundle they have paid for. A product page that loads several megabytes of images and scripts is effectively asking the customer to pay before they have decided whether they are interested. We treat page weight as part of the price of using our shop, and we try to keep that price as low as we can."

What does that mean in practice?

"It starts with photography. Every image is compressed and resized for the screen it will be shown on, so a customer on a small phone does not download a picture prepared for a large monitor. We limit the number of fonts and scripts on each page, and we load the essential information first: what the product is, what it costs and how to order it. Reviews, recommendations and other secondary content follow once that is in place."

How do you test this?

"We test on the devices and connections our customers actually use. That includes entry-level Android phones and slower mobile networks, as well as connections that drop and recover during a session. A page that performs well under those conditions will perform well everywhere else."

Does that limit what the shop can do?

"It means every new feature has to justify its cost to the customer. Some ideas do not pass that test, and we are comfortable with that. Our priority is that ordering from Buntu feels quick and dependable, whatever phone or connection someone is using."

The performance work is ongoing, and page weight is reviewed as part of every release.

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