A 10-minute mobile check for a small business website
Many visitors see your site for the first time on a phone, while you usually update it from a computer. This checklist helps you find the problems that show up at first glance on a phone, in about ten minutes, with a phone and free tools.
The checklist
- Viewport and horizontal overflow: open the page on a phone. Is the text comfortable to read, or are you looking at a shrunken desktop page? Try swiping sideways; if the page moves, something is wider than the screen. On a computer, search the page source for “viewport”; without that tag, phones draw the page at desktop width. The device mode in your browser’s developer tools lets you try other screen widths too.
- Tap targets: try the menu, the phone number, the WhatsApp link and the form button with your thumb. If you hit the wrong link, or links sit very close together, the targets are too small. The accessibility guideline WCAG 2.2 sets 24×24 CSS pixels as the minimum target size and 44×44 as a more comfortable target.
- A form that actually delivers: send the form from the phone and check that the message reaches you; a “sent” message on screen is not enough. The steps are in the contact form guide.
- HTTPS and certificate expiry: check that the address opens with https:// and no warning. On a computer, open the certificate details from the icon in the address bar and look at the expiry date; the free SSL Labs server test also shows validity and whether the certificate matches the domain. If expiry is close, confirm with your host that automatic renewal is on.
- Leftover placeholder text: use your browser’s “find in page” to search for “lorem”, “ipsum”, “placeholder text” or “your text here”. A search engine query such as site:yourdomain.com "lorem ipsum" can reveal leftovers on other pages.
- Copyright year: a footer year from years ago can make visitors think the site is abandoned. Update it, or leave the year out.
- Page speed basics: open the page on mobile data rather than Wi-Fi. Enter your address in the free PageSpeed Insights tool; it shows Core Web Vitals from real users when there is enough data, plus a lab test and suggestions in every case. The “good” thresholds are 2.5 seconds for LCP, 200 milliseconds for INP and 0.1 for CLS. A common cause of slow pages is photos uploaded at full camera size.
Fix or rebuild?
These are usually fixed on the existing site: an expired or mismatched certificate, a broken form, leftover placeholder text, an old copyright year, oversized photos and individual elements that overflow (a wide table or a fixed-width image).
A rebuild is often less work when:
- The layout is built at a fixed width, and adding the viewport tag makes it worse rather than better.
- The site depends on a theme, plugin or site builder that is no longer updated, and updates break it.
- Nobody has access to the admin panel, the hosting or the domain.
- Most items on the list fail at once, and each needs separate work.
Before deciding, write the fixes down as a list. The longer it gets, the easier it is to compare with a rebuild.
How often?
Repeat this check every three months and after any change to the site. If your site does not pass, tell us the address and we will tell you which items are simple fixes and which point to a rebuild.