The mobile readiness scorecard: score your site in an hour

Key takeaways

A mobile website scorecard replaces opinion with a number. The GBL Mobile Readiness Scorecard tests five things on a real phone, Read, Tap, Speed, Act and Parity, each scored 0, 1 or 2. It takes about an hour, needs no specialist tools, and tells you whether to fix, redesign or leave alone.

• Five tests, 0 to 2 each, for a total out of 10.
• 8 to 10 is mobile-ready. 5 to 7 is usable but leaking. 4 or below is failing.
• Score on a real phone over mobile data, not in a browser on a laptop.
• Fix the lowest score first: one zero costs more than three ones.

What is the GBL Mobile Readiness Scorecard?

The GBL Mobile Readiness Scorecard is a five-part test of how well a business website works on a phone, covering readability, tap targets, speed, ease of action and content parity with desktop. Each part is scored 0, 1 or 2, giving a total out of 10 that can be tracked over time.

Global Bridge Labs (GBL) uses it at the start of website work because it is quick, repeatable and hard to argue with. Two people scoring the same site on the same phone should land within a point of each other. It is deliberately practical: every test is something a customer would experience, not a line in a technical report.

• Why mobile-friendly web design is essential for UK businesses
• Make your website work properly on mobile

How do you score each of the five tests?

Score each test on your top three landing pages, using a phone on mobile data with Wi-Fi switched off. Give 2 when the test is fully met, 1 when it is partly met, and 0 when a typical visitor would struggle. Take the lowest score across the three pages for each test.

• Read: 2 if all text is legible without zooming and nothing scrolls sideways; 0 if you have to pinch.
• Tap: 2 if every button and link can be hit first time with a thumb; 0 if you mis-tap more than once.
• Speed: 2 if the page is usable in about 2.5 seconds; 1 if under 4; 0 if longer.
• Act: 2 if you can call, message or enquire in under a minute from any page; 0 if you have to hunt.
• Parity: 2 if mobile shows the same content as desktop; 0 if sections, links or pages are missing.

• Font size for mobile websites: what is readable?
• Tap target size: how big should buttons be on mobile?
• Does Google index content hidden on mobile?

What does your total score mean?

A total of 8 to 10 means the site is mobile-ready: keep it that way with a quarterly re-score. A total of 5 to 7 means the site is usable but leaking enquiries, and targeted fixes on the existing site are the right response. A total of 4 or below means the site is failing on phones and needs a structural change.

• 8 to 10: maintain. Re-score every quarter and after any redesign.
• 5 to 7: fix in place. Indicative £500 to £3,000 of focused work.
• 4 or below: redesign or rebuild. Indicative £3,000 to £20,000 or more.
• Any single 0: fix that first, whatever the total.

• What it costs to make a website mobile-friendly in the UK

How does the score relate to Google's own measures?

The Speed test maps to Core Web Vitals, where Google's threshold for a good Largest Contentful Paint is 2.5 seconds at the 75th percentile of real visits. The Tap test reflects Google's web.dev recommendation of touch targets around 48 pixels with about 8 pixels between them. Parity reflects mobile-first indexing, under which Google indexes the mobile version of your content.

The scorecard is not a substitute for PageSpeed Insights or Search Console. It is the human check that sits alongside them. A page can pass every automated audit and still hide the phone number in the footer, which no tool will flag and every customer will notice.

• Core Web Vitals for business websites
• Google's Mobile-Friendly Test has gone: how to test now

What are the limits of a scorecard?

A scorecard measures the experience, not the outcome. A site can score 9 and still produce few enquiries if the offer is unclear, the prices are wrong or the traffic is poor. Use it alongside your conversion data: the score explains why mobile visitors struggle, and the data tells you how much it matters.

It also depends on the phone and connection you test with. A flagship handset on fast 5G hides problems that a three-year-old Android on patchy 4G will expose. If you can only test on one device, borrow the oldest phone in the office.

• Which devices should you test your website on?
• The website conversion scorecard: good or high-converting?

What does this look like in practice?

A pattern we see when owners score their own site for the first time: they expect a 9 and record a 5. Read and Parity pass, because the site is responsive and modern. Tap scores 1 because the menu links sit too close together. Speed scores 1 on mobile data. Act scores 0, because the only route to an enquiry is a contact page three taps away.

That profile is common and encouraging. Nothing in it needs a new website. A persistent Call and WhatsApp bar lifts Act from 0 to 2 on its own, and compressing the hero image usually moves Speed up a point. The total goes from 5 to 8 with a few days of work.

• See client work
• Website Design & Development for UK businesses

Scorecard checklist

• Pick your top three landing pages from analytics.
• Use a real phone on mobile data, ideally a mid-range one.
• Score Read, Tap, Speed, Act and Parity from 0 to 2 on each page.
• Take the lowest score per test and add them up.
• Write down the specific reason for every score below 2.
• Fix any 0 first, then the 1s on your highest-traffic page.
• Re-score after the changes and again each quarter.

• A 90-day plan to make your website mobile-friendly

Next step

Set aside an hour this week, pick up a phone and score your site honestly. The number you get is the most useful input to any conversation about your website, whether with us or with anyone else.