When To Use Synthetic Monitoring vs. Real User Monitoring

Most web teams start their performance journey with synthetic monitoring. You spin up a Lighthouse test or an uptime checker, set a few thresholds and call it good.

But inevitably, the bug reports roll in. You may hear users complaining about your site feeling slow on mobile or reporting checkout or other app functionalities freezing in specific geo-locations. You may notice rendering inconsistencies across different browsers that pop up out in the real world. In these situations, you may notice that your dashboards are green, yet your users…