What is SpeedCurve?
SpeedCurve is a synthetic and real-user web performance monitoring platform built specifically for tracking page speed over time. It runs scheduled Lighthouse audits and WebPageTest runs, captures filmstrips and waterfalls, and exposes Core Web Vitals trends through dashboards designed for performance teams. Founded in 2013 by Mark Zeman, SpeedCurve carved out a niche among performance specialists who wanted more than what's in PageSpeed Insights' free tier. Embrace announced its acquisition of SpeedCurve in November 2025, and the product is still sold as SpeedCurve.
SpeedCurve's strength is depth: budgets per metric, page comparisons, video filmstrips, and integration with WebPageTest's scriptable tests. Its weakness is price at volume: the Starter plan starts at $90/month and Growth at $576/month (Enterprise is custom), and plans are sized by synthetic checks and RUM page views per month rather than by page count. Every page, location and run uses checks, so for SaaS companies testing 50+ marketing pages several times a day, or high-traffic e-commerce sites on RUM, SpeedCurve gets expensive fast.
When SpeedCurve is the right tool
SpeedCurve is excellent, and reasonably priced for what it does, when these conditions match:
- You're a performance specialist, not a generalist. SpeedCurve assumes the user knows what RUM, TTFB, and LCP mean and wants control over budget thresholds, comparison snapshots, and per-page configurations. The depth is the product.
- Page count is small. For 5-20 critical pages (homepage, category, product detail, checkout), SpeedCurve's volume-based pricing (synthetic checks and RUM page views) is fair. Test more pages, more often, and the check count and the price climb with it.
- You want WebPageTest-grade depth. SpeedCurve was built around WebPageTest and exposes filmstrips, video, request waterfalls, and connection-level timing. If you want the kind of forensic detail performance engineers love, SpeedCurve has it.
- RUM matters and you have traffic. SpeedCurve's LUX product (RUM) needs JavaScript on your pages and meaningful traffic to produce signal. For high-traffic sites, the field data is genuinely useful for ranking and prioritizing optimizations.
Where SpeedCurve gets expensive or limiting
- Pricing scales with check volume. Every monitored page, location and test run uses synthetic checks, so monitoring many pages at a high frequency moves you from Starter ($90/month) toward Growth (from $576/month). For sites with hundreds of templates, the spend climbs.
- No load testing. SpeedCurve measures real-user and synthetic page performance. It doesn't simulate concurrent users to validate that the site stays fast under traffic. For pre-launch capacity validation, you need a separate tool.
- No API monitoring. SpeedCurve focuses on browser-based performance. For multi-step API workflows (login → token → call), you need a dedicated API monitoring tool.
- Steep learning curve. SpeedCurve's depth is also its complexity. Marketing teams and product managers find the dashboards dense; performance engineers love them.
LoadFocus vs SpeedCurve: feature comparison
The table below compares LoadFocus against SpeedCurve's core synthetic + RUM offering. Pricing from the SpeedCurve pricing page, checked October 2026.
| Feature | LoadFocus | SpeedCurve |
|---|---|---|
| Entry-tier pricing | Free; paid from $39/mo ($29/mo billed yearly) | From $90/mo (Starter) |
| Lighthouse-based synthetic audits | Yes. 25+ regions on schedule | Yes (SpeedCurve Synthetic) |
| WebPageTest integration | No | Yes (deep) |
| Real-user monitoring (RUM) | No RUM script of its own; Google CrUX field data with alerts | Yes (SpeedCurve RUM, formerly LUX) |
| Page coverage at $200-300/mo tier | Pro, $249/mo ($169 billed yearly): 10,000 tests a month, about 330 pages tested daily | No page cap; limited by monthly synthetic checks |
| Core Web Vitals tracking | Yes (LCP, INP, CLS) | Yes (LCP, INP, CLS) |
| Performance budget alerts | Yes (custom thresholds) | Yes (per-metric) |
| Video filmstrips | No (snapshots only) | Yes |
| Load testing (concurrent users) | Yes. JMeter + k6 | No |
| Multi-step API monitoring | Yes, on paid plans (login → token → call) | No |
| Free tier with cloud audits | Yes (1 test a month) | No (30-day free trial) |
When LoadFocus is the right alternative for SpeedCurve users
Page count exceeds your SpeedCurve budget
SpeedCurve's check-based pricing is fair for small page sets but climbs with scale, since every page and every run uses synthetic checks. LoadFocus page speed monitoring is priced by tests a month instead: Basic at $119/month ($89 billed yearly) includes 5,000 Lighthouse tests, enough for about 160 pages tested once a day.
You also need load testing
Page speed regressions and load-induced regressions correlate. Investigating both in two separate tools is wasted time. LoadFocus combines Lighthouse-based speed monitoring with JMeter and k6 load testing in one platform, same dashboard, same alerting.
You need API monitoring on the same platform
SpeedCurve doesn't do API monitoring. If your stack has APIs that need scheduled health checks (status, latency, response shape, multi-step workflows), LoadFocus does both browser performance and API monitoring in one product, replacing SpeedCurve plus a separate API tool.
Your team needs simpler dashboards
SpeedCurve is built for performance specialists. If non-engineers (product, marketing, ops) need to read your dashboards, LoadFocus' UI is more approachable.
You want a free tier that includes cloud audits
SpeedCurve offers a 30-day free trial but no free plan. The LoadFocus free plan is small: 1 page speed test a month, enough to see how it works. Ongoing monitoring starts with Starter at $39/month ($29 billed yearly) for 300 tests a month. For one-off checks there is also the free website speed test and Core Web Vitals checker.
Migration: from SpeedCurve to LoadFocus
Migrating SpeedCurve synthetic audits to LoadFocus is straightforward:
- Sign up at loadfocus.com/signup.
- For each SpeedCurve URL, create a LoadFocus website-speed-test schedule with the same URL and frequency (daily, hourly, etc.).
- Copy your performance budgets (LCP under X ms, CLS under Y) into LoadFocus alert thresholds.
- Replicate alert routing (email, Slack or Microsoft Teams).
- Run both tools in parallel for two weeks to validate the data matches, then sunset SpeedCurve.
RUM data doesn't migrate. LoadFocus has no RUM script of its own; it shows Google's CrUX field data for your pages, which only exists for pages with enough Chrome traffic. Many teams keep a small SpeedCurve plan just for RUM and use LoadFocus for synthetic + load testing + API monitoring.
FAQ: LoadFocus vs SpeedCurve
Is LoadFocus cheaper than SpeedCurve at scale?
For synthetic monitoring, usually yes. SpeedCurve's Starter plan starts at $90/month and Growth at $576/month, both sized by monthly synthetic checks and RUM page views, so testing 50+ pages several times a day pushes you toward the higher tiers. LoadFocus page speed is $119/month ($89 billed yearly) for 5,000 Lighthouse tests a month on Basic and $249/month ($169 billed yearly) for 10,000 on Pro.
Does LoadFocus integrate with WebPageTest?
Not natively. SpeedCurve's WebPageTest integration is unique, if filmstrips, video, and the WebPageTest connection-level metrics are essential for your workflow, SpeedCurve remains the right tool. LoadFocus uses Lighthouse, which covers Core Web Vitals and most performance audits but doesn't expose WebPageTest's depth.
Can LoadFocus replace SpeedCurve's RUM?
For most teams, no. SpeedCurve RUM collects data from your own visitors with a JavaScript snippet; LoadFocus has no such snippet and shows Google's CrUX field data next to its Lighthouse results instead. If RUM is your primary use case, SpeedCurve is better. If synthetic monitoring is your primary use case (and most CWV work is), LoadFocus is cheaper and faster to set up.
How do the Core Web Vitals dashboards compare?
Both tools show LCP/INP/CLS trends with budget thresholds. SpeedCurve's are more polished and offer per-page comparisons; LoadFocus' are simpler but cover the same key metrics. For most SEO-driven CWV work, both are sufficient, the differentiator is price at scale.
Does LoadFocus support performance budgets?
Yes. Set thresholds per metric (LCP under 2.5 s, CLS under 0.1, etc.) and LoadFocus alerts when audits breach them. Same workflow as SpeedCurve's budgets, different UI.
Can I export LoadFocus data to my own dashboards?
Partly. Page speed results stay in LoadFocus, with alerts by email, Slack or Microsoft Teams when a score or a Core Web Vital crosses your threshold. There is no Prometheus or InfluxDB export. LoadFocus load tests are the exception: they stream metrics to Datadog, New Relic, Dynatrace, Azure Application Insights or any OpenTelemetry backend.
Try LoadFocus free
If SpeedCurve's check-based pricing is forcing you to monitor fewer pages than you want, or if you're paying for SpeedCurve plus separate load-test and API-monitoring tools, LoadFocus combines synthetic CWV monitoring + load testing + API monitoring in one platform. Sign up at loadfocus.com/signup and run your first scheduled audit in under five minutes.
