How to fix it
Add width and height attributes to each image tag, matching its natural proportions. The browser scales them; the point is the ratio.
When it is not a problem
Images sized by CSS with an aspect-ratio rule are stable without the attributes, and this check reads attributes and inline style only. Treat it as a pointer to check, not a verdict.
How Rankelle handles it
- SeverityInformational. Often correct as it stands, and reported so you can see the pattern rather than so you can clear it.
- DetectionDetected on a single page while crawling it, then grouped with the other pages under the same URL pattern.
- GroupingEvery page with this finding under the same URL pattern becomes one cause, with a confidence taken from how much of the pattern is affected. 400 of 400 is a template; 6 of 14 is phrased as a question. Causes are ranked by the impressions behind their pages.
- LandingThe affected URLs stay under cheap watch. When this finding is gone from all of them, the fix is marked landed without anyone reporting the deploy.
- VerdictAt landing, comparable untouched URLs are frozen as a control set. Twenty-eight days later the two are compared, and the fix can come back as having done nothing — all four verdicts reach the report.
Why the rule says this: Cumulative Layout Shift is one of the three Core Web Vitals in Google's page experience signals. Expiry condition: Google drops layout shift from Core Web Vitals.
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