Title: Cache Preload confusion
Last modified: August 31, 2016

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# Cache Preload confusion

 *  [Alwin](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wp-opti/)
 * (@wp-opti)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/)
 * I have enabled “Automatically prime the page cache” under Cache Preload.
 * – update interval: 900 seconds
    – pages per interval: 10
 * Now when I look in my logfiles I see that W3TC is hitting 14 pages every 15 minutes.
   I assume that this is the Cache Preload in action? But why is it 14 pages and
   not 10 (as I set up)?
 * Then one other question about the Cache Preload: my websites are almost never
   changing, they stay the same for long periods like 6 months. In this case, can
   I reduce the Cache Preload from 900 seconds to something like once a day? Is 
   there any disadvantage for setting Cache Preload to only once a day?
 * [https://wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/)

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)

 *  [Scott Hartley](https://wordpress.org/support/users/destac/)
 * (@destac)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7298992)
 * The page cache should stay cached unless the cache was purged meaning an action
   caused the page to need to be re crawled.
 * In the sitemap url did you place a link to your sitemap?
 *  Thread Starter [Alwin](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wp-opti/)
 * (@wp-opti)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7298993)
 * Destac, I did place a link to my sitemap.
 * Now what is the best thing to do when a website is not changing? Just disable
   to Cache Preload at all?
 * Or set it to once a day or so?
 *  [Scott Hartley](https://wordpress.org/support/users/destac/)
 * (@destac)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7299008)
 * The cache preload is meant to go to the website, and if there is a change it 
   will cache that file. Then it goes to the next (no change it skips). The fact
   it’s not doing this is odd. How many pages in total do you have on the website
   in question?
 *  Thread Starter [Alwin](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wp-opti/)
 * (@wp-opti)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7299031)
 * Destac, I have set Cache Preload at 3600 seconds now, with 10 pages interval,
   and this is what happens (what I can see in Wordfence Live Traffic view):
 * – every 1 hour the cache preload starts with visiting /sitemap_index.xml
    – then
   second /page-sitemap.xml – then /attachment-sitemap.xml – then /portfolio-sitemap.
   xml
 * After these 4 hits, there are always 10 other pages visited. These pages seems
   to be randomly picked?
 * As I said before my website pages are not changing, they all stay the same.
 * So do you think this is the way the cache preload is supposed to work? Is this
   normal?
 *  [Scott Hartley](https://wordpress.org/support/users/destac/)
 * (@destac)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7299053)
 * Go to your page cache settings. Scroll down to garbage collection interval and
   increase the amount of time.
 *  Thread Starter [Alwin](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wp-opti/)
 * (@wp-opti)
 * [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7299062)
 * I have garbage collection set at 3600 now, just like the cache preload.
 * Why do you advice me to increase the garbage collection interval? Is there a 
   direct relation between the garbage collection interval and the cache preload
   interval?

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)

The topic ‘Cache Preload confusion’ is closed to new replies.

 * ![](https://ps.w.org/w3-total-cache/assets/icon-256x256.png?rev=1041806)
 * [W3 Total Cache](https://wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/)
 * [Frequently Asked Questions](https://wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/#faq)
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 * 6 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [Alwin](https://wordpress.org/support/users/wp-opti/)
 * Last activity: [10 years, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/cache-preload-confusion/#post-7299062)
 * Status: not resolved