The first time you visit a site, the browser (in the case of Validately, the browser needed for proper functionality is Google Chrome or MS Edge) will save pieces of the site (like images, etc), because the browser can display the files stored in its cache much faster than it can pull fresh files from a server. The next time you visit that site, the cached files will help cut down the page load time.
Problems can arise if the connection is using an older version of cache and the site has since updated….this causes, simply, confusion! Clearing the cache will allow a fresh connection to be established and is a good first step in troubleshooting issues with connections and speed of page loading.
To clear cache, follow these steps:
In Chrome
- On your computer, open Chrome
- At the top right, click More
- Click More tools, Clear browsing data. (on a Mac, you will see this option under the Chrome menu tab at the top left of the window)
- At the top, choose a time range. To delete everything, select All time.
- Check the boxes "Cookies and other site data" and "Cached images and files"
- Click Clear data
This clears all cache, which is great, but what if you want to only clear the cache for one site? This is also possible!
- Open Chrome and visit the website you want to clear the cache for.
- Open the developer tools by hitting the Ctrl+Shift+I keyboard shortcut (command, option, I on a Mac).
- Once the developer console is open, right-click the reload button next to the address bar.
- The context menu will have three options; Normal Reload, Hard Reload, and Empty Cache and Hard Reload.
- The third option is what you’re looking for. Click ‘Empty Cache and Hard Reload’ to clear the cache for a particular website. (This reload menu isn’t available unless you have the developer console open. If you right-click the reload button with the developer console closed, you don’t get any sort of menu.)