A Joomla 4 and 5 component that outputs an empty page for a menu item. Useful for the home page and landing pages: no database queries or article rendering, so the page is built faster.
Blank page does one thing: it displays an empty page on the site, attached to a menu item. The component output on that page puts no load on either the database or page rendering. This is most often needed on the home page or on dedicated landing pages.
Why it is needed
By default, the Joomla home page is a Featured Articles menu item. It is one of the heaviest pages among the core Joomla components: while it is built, the user's access rights are checked and database queries are run, which increases both memory use and rendering time. Nothing happens at this step in Blank page, so the home page consumes fewer resources. This matters most on high-traffic sites.
Why not use the template
- Not all templates can disable component output on a specific page.
- Not all templates let such edits be made safely, so that they survive a component or template update.
- Not every webmaster is able to make the required template changes.
Installation and setup
- Install the package through the Joomla Extension Manager.
- Create a menu item of the Blank page type.
- For the home page, make this menu item the default instead of Featured Articles.
Test results
The developer compared the two menu item types for the home page: Cassiopeia template, Joomla 5.0.0, three modules on the page (JL Content fields filter, Breadcrumbs and a menu), four articles in the database, none of them featured. Local server: PHP 8.1.9, MySQL 8.0.30, Windows 10.
- Featured Articles: rendering mostly 370–400 ms (range 267–497 ms), 18.188 MB of memory.
- Blank page: rendering mostly 290–340 ms (range 264–420 ms), 16.309 MB of memory.
Compatibility and requirements
- Joomla 4 (4.1 or later) and Joomla 5; the developer has also tested it on Joomla 6 alpha 2.
- PHP 7.4 or later.
- Free component.
