Whoosh vs RoarTheme: is the free next-page app enough?

The shopper is on the navy beanie, and the charcoal one is next

You sell knitted beanies, and the navy one is the hat most people find first. A shopper opens it on their phone, looks at the photo, scrolls past the description, and spots the charcoal beanie in the row of other hats underneath. They tap it, and that second page is the wait RoarTheme’s free app is built for.

RoarTheme also sells Shopify themes, but this post is about its free speed app, RT: Page Speed Booster, not a theme. Whoosh gets a likely next page ready too, and it also works on the navy page itself, before anyone taps. We make Whoosh, so read the table with that in mind.

So which one does your store need? It comes down to where the shopper waited: when the navy beanie first opened, or after they tapped the charcoal one.

What each app does before the charcoal tap

Let’s start with RT, because its whole job is that tap. While the shopper is reading about the navy beanie, their phone has quiet moments where it’s mostly waiting for them. RT’s App Store listing says the app tells the browser to use that idle time to fetch, or get ready to fetch, the page they’re likely to open next.

So when they tap the charcoal beanie, some of that page is already on the phone, and it opens sooner. People call that prefetching. Mozilla’s note on this fetch says browsers treat it as less urgent than the page already on screen, because the current page is more important than the next one, so the charcoal request should not shove the navy beanie aside. The listing is about that next page, so it is not a promise that the navy photo shows up any sooner.

The same listing keeps the rest short. It’s free, it says setup takes a few clicks, and it says it works with all themes, including customised ones.

It says the app makes pages feel instant and improves your conversion rate, and it gives no number for either. It doesn’t say how it picks which link to fetch, or whether it changes your theme.

The App Store files RT under SEO, but the description is about the next page on your store, not the line under your link in Google, so don’t expect it to write anything for search.

Now Whoosh. When the navy beanie page opens, your email popup, chat bubble, and review stars start loading too, and each one is a small program from another company.

Whoosh holds those programs back until the navy beanie photo is on screen, and it fetches that photo early, because it knows from real shoppers which photo is the big one on the page. You keep every app.

Whoosh also guesses the page a shopper is likely to open next and gets it ready before they tap. It never does that for the cart, checkout, or account pages. There’s no code to write, and it doesn’t copy your theme.

So how would you know any of it worked? Whoosh splits your visitors 50/50, half with it on and half with it off, and compares what each half bought.

Why the free app is the better buy for the second tap

Here’s the plain version, and it isn’t in our favour. If the navy beanie opened fine and the only wait you felt was after tapping charcoal, RT is aimed at that exact wait, and it costs nothing. Whoosh’s next-page job sits on a paid plan in the table, so for that one wait, the free app is the better buy.

But here’s the catch. Getting the charcoal page ready doesn’t change what happens when the navy page first opens. If a signup popup covers the navy beanie before its photo arrives, or the chat bubble pops up while the photo is still blank, RT’s listing doesn’t describe doing anything about it.

That’s the part Whoosh takes on. The popup still asks for an email and the chat still answers, and they just wait for the navy beanie. The 50/50 test then tells you whether that changed what people bought, which is a different question from whether a page feels faster.

I know what you’re thinking. Why not keep the free app and add Whoosh on top? You can. RT’s listing doesn’t describe holding the popup or the chat, so that job is still open. What we have not tested is both apps fetching the charcoal page at once. If the Whoosh plan in the table is the one that gets the next page ready, turn RT off first. Then tap the popup, the chat, and the charcoal beanie on your phone.

Tap the charcoal beanie on your phone, in a private tab

This check needs one phone and two product pages. Open the navy beanie’s live product page in a private tab, using the link a shopper would tap, not the theme editor, which can hide your apps and won’t behave like the store.

Watch the first moments. Does the navy beanie photo arrive first, or does a popup, a chat bubble, or a row of review stars get there before it? If it’s too quick to call, record your screen and play it back slowly.

Then stay on the navy beanie for a few seconds, the way a shopper reads the description. RT’s listing says it works in idle time, so a tap the instant the page opens may not give it any. Scroll to the charcoal beanie and tap it. Does it open straight away, or is there a blank moment first?

Make sure charcoal is its own product with its own page, like a hat in that row underneath. If it’s a colour button on the navy page, you aren’t opening a new page, and neither app’s next-page fetch is what you’re testing.

Now read what you saw. If the navy page was quick and the charcoal tap dragged, install RT, since it’s free, and tap again. If a popup or chat beat the navy beanie photo, that’s Whoosh’s job, and the plans are in the table above.

If the wait was a white screen before anything on the navy page appeared, and nothing beat the photo, neither app is aimed at it. The speed app comparison matches that wait to the apps that clear it.

Whichever you install, let it run on real shoppers for a while, then pick up the same phone and open the navy beanie in a fresh private tab.

Tap the popup and the chat on the way past so you know they still open, read for a moment, and tap the charcoal beanie. If it opens straight away and the popup still asks for an email, you picked the right row.