Is Server Side Rendering Better For SEO?

Rendering plays a vital role in your website's functionality, allowing Google to access your webpages, interpret the code, and grasp its content and structure.

This process transforms the code into an interactive webpage for users.

Since every webpage should prioritize the user experience, selecting the right type of rendering is essential when building your website.

Two standard methods of website rendering are server-side rendering (SSR) and client-side rendering (CSR). Each website has its own requirements, so understanding the differences between these two methods is crucial for making the right choice.

This blog post will help you understand server-side rendering vs. client-side rendering, how they work, their advantages and disadvantages, and which one aligns with your business goals.

Server-side rendering is when a website’s content is processed on the web server instead of in the browser. The server generates an HTML file with user-specific data and sends it to the user’s device.

The browser then interprets the HTML and displays the page, delivering a fully rendered webpage without waiting for JavaScript or CSS files to load.

Many believe this approach is better for SEO than client-side rendering, but let’s first examine how SSR SEO works.

As discussed earlier, server-side rendering ensures website content is displayed quickly by removing the need to download and execute application code in the browser. But how exactly is HTML rendered on the server when a user navigates a webpage?

• The user opens a browser and requests the webpage.

• The server prepares and sends a rendered HTML file to the user. The browser displays the CSS, but the page is not interactive yet.

• The browser downloads the JavaScript for the page, which is stored on the server.

• The user can now interact with the webpage and its elements.

• The browser processes the JavaScript, and the Document Object Model (DOM) is fully rendered.

• The page is now fully loaded and responds to user interactions.

Popular JavaScript frameworks like React and Angular support server-side rendering. Social platforms like Facebook and Twitter also use this method to deliver pre-rendered content to users.

With SSR SEO, only the necessary parts of the HTML are updated, allowing for quicker page transitions and significantly faster First Contentful Paint (FCP).

Even users with slower internet connections or older devices can engage with your webpages almost immediately.

The faster your site loads, the better it is for SEO, as no one enjoys staring at a loading screen.

Search engines find it much easier to index SSR SEO sites compared to client-side rendered ones. Since the content is rendered before the page loads, search engines don’t need to execute JavaScript to read and index your content.

SSR is highly efficient for static webpages. Pre-rendering static content on the server ensures it is sent to the client faster, enhancing performance and user experience.

SSR SEO provides the ability to track user behavior more accurately, helping maintain an optimized website.

Unlike client-side rendering, SSR reports user activity to the server as they navigate between pages. This insight into how users interact with your content allows for continuous improvements to your user interface (UI) and user experience (UX).

SSR SEO also enhances your website’s optimization for social media.

Whenever you share a page, it will display a preview with the title, description, and image, creating a polished and professional impression on social platforms.

With SSR, the server handles all user and bot requests, which can strain resources.

This added burden can slow down loading times for larger, more complex applications, as the server becomes a bottleneck.

SSR can become costly as the complexity of maintaining and debugging increases, making it more error-prone.

Additionally, you’ll need to host the SSR SEO application on your company’s server, which will increase operational expenses.

SSR may not work seamlessly with certain third-party libraries and tools, especially those involving JavaScript code.

While users can see the page immediately, they must wait for the JavaScript to finish downloading before interacting with it, which can be frustrating.

Efficient caching is crucial for quick data retrieval, but with SSR SEO, each page’s HTML is unique.

This makes it more difficult to cache content on a content delivery network (CDN). As a result, users loading a page that isn’t cached on the CDN will face longer page load times.

When comparing server side vs. client side rendering, it’s important to understand each's strengths and drawbacks. This will help you choose the right option for your website that aligns with your business goals.

Server-side rendering ensures fast page loading, which is critical for a good user experience. The pre-rendered content in SSR SEO also helps improve search engine visibility, enhancing your website's ranking. SSR works best for websites with mostly static content that doesn't change frequently.

By processing more content on the server, SSR SEO delivers a consistent experience over time and reduces the load on users’ devices. SSR’s pre-rendered content also makes caching easier and reduces server load for subsequent user requests, improving performance.

However, SSR struggles to render third-party JavaScript, so elements like reviews or personalized recommendations from external sources won’t appear on the fully rendered page. Other limitations of SSR include reduced interactivity and delays in content updates.

Client-side rendering uses JavaScript to render dynamic content, creating an interactive user interface. CSR allows for content updates without requiring a full page reload, enhancing the user experience. CSR is ideal for websites with frequently updated content and empowers applications with rich features, increasing user engagement.

CSR also optimizes server resources by distributing the rendering processes, which is especially useful for websites with content that users update frequently.

On the flip side, CSR can face SEO challenges and slower initial load times for websites with heavy content. It also struggles with scalability under high website traffic unless resources are efficiently managed.

SEO is measured by performance metrics (such as page loading time), structured data (including semantic and information architecture), and user experience (good usability), helping more users find and access your content.

However, with the rise of Single-Page Application (SPA) frameworks like Angular and React, many websites have seen a drop in online visibility and search engine rankings.

This happens because these frameworks render the page content in the browser (Client-side) via JavaScript file downloads, making it difficult for search engine crawlers to inspect the page content.

To make your website more SEO-friendly, it's better to generate pages on the server side (Server-side Rendering, SSR SEO). This ensures that content is readily available and more easily crawlable when a URL is accessed. Next.js and Headless CMS for SEO can help with this.

From a marketing standpoint, newer products and services often require a flexible, fast, and scalable approach to content delivery. With the rise of single-page applications (SPAs) and dynamic content, traditional client-side rendering (CSR) struggles to deliver the speed and SEO benefits needed for successful digital marketing. This is where SSR SEO steps in—it offers faster load times, improved indexing, and a more stable user experience, making it ideal for modern marketing strategies.

Source: Acumen Research and Consulting

At Muoro, we use Next.js and a headless CMS to address these challenges. Next.js provides server-side rendering, ensuring that content is rendered on the server and sent as fully loaded HTML to the browser.

Here’s how we do it:

Managing content can be a hassle, especially when you need frequent updates. We use a headless CMS to separate content management from the design and functionality of the website. This means that content creators can update text, images, or other assets in real-time without involving developers or redeploying the site.

Next.js plays a crucial role here by fetching fresh data from the CMS whenever needed. For instance:

• If you update a blog post in the CMS, users will see the changes instantly.

• With Next.js's server-side rendering (SSR), the updated content is pre-rendered on the server and sent to users as fully loaded pages.

SEO is a big deal for any website, and that's where Next.js shines. By using SSR SEO, we ensure that search engines receive fully rendered HTML pages instead of JavaScript-heavy content that’s harder to crawl.

Here’s how it works:

• When someone visits your website, Next.js fetches data from the CMS (using getServerSideProps) and renders the page on the server.

• The result? Faster load times for users and better visibility on search engines like Google.

Additionally, we dynamically set metadata (like page titles and descriptions) based on the content fetched from the CMS, giving your site an extra SEO boost.

One of the biggest advantages of using a headless CMS with Next.js is flexibility. Since the content (backend) is decoupled from the frontend (your website), it’s easy to make changes or scale up as your business grows.

For example:

• Want to switch to a different CMS? No problem—your frontend remains unaffected.

• Need to handle more traffic? Next.js’s optimized performance ensures your site scales seamlessly.

This flexibility allows us to future-proof your application, so you’re not locked into one system or technology.

We don’t just focus on functionality—user experience matters too. We pair Next.js with modern tools like Material-UI for sleek designs and Emotion for fast-loading styles. This ensures your site looks great and performs even better.

Whether optimizing images for faster load times or ensuring responsiveness across devices, we ensure that your users have a smooth experience every time they visit your site.

Here’s what happens behind the scenes when we build your website:

• Content Creation: You or your team add content (like blog posts or product details) in a headless CMS.

• Data Fetching: When someone visits your site, Next.js fetches this content in real-time using APIs.

• Rendering: The server renders a fully loaded page with this content and sends it to the user.

• User Interaction: Visitors see updated content instantly and enjoy fast page loads.

By combining Next.js with a headless CMS, Muoro helps businesses solve key challenges:

Keeping websites fast and responsive.

• Ensuring search engines can easily crawl and rank pages.

• Allowing non-developers to manage content effortlessly.

• Building scalable solutions that grow with your business.

With this approach, we don’t just build websites—we create powerful digital experiences that are easy to manage, perform brilliantly, and rank well on search engines. Whether you're running an e-commerce store, a blog, or a corporate website, this combination can transform how you deliver value online.

Choosing the right rendering method is key to building a website that works for both users and businesses.

In a nutshell, Server-side rendering offers the benefits of faster load times and better SEO, enhancing the user experience and boosting visibility in search engine results. However, if you're looking for frameworks, Next.js, alongside a headless CMS, can help you make the most of SSR SEO.

This approach enables you to create fast-loading, search engine-optimized pages that are easy to maintain and scale as your business grows. Ultimately, the rendering method you choose will significantly impact your website's performance and user experience.

Want to explore how Muoro's software engineers can help you? You can talk to us.