Lightning Experience Insights
Lightning Experience Insights is the set of built-in analytics features that show administrators and executives how people use Lightning Experience and how well it performs.
Definition
Lightning Experience Insights is the set of built-in analytics features that show administrators and executives how people use Lightning Experience and how well it performs. The most visible surface is the Lightning Usage App, a packaged app that reports daily active users, the pages people visit most, how often users switch back to Salesforce Classic, and page-load timing measured as Experienced Page Time (EPT). You open it from the App Launcher by searching for Lightning Usage, and it ships with Lightning Experience at no extra cost.
These insights exist because moving from Classic to Lightning was the platform's largest user-experience change. Admins needed a clear answer to two questions: are people actually using Lightning, and are the pages fast enough to keep them there. The Lightning Usage App answers both with ready-made dashboards instead of asking every customer to build reports by hand. Today most orgs run on Lightning, so the data matters less for migration tracking and more for ongoing tuning, such as finding slow record pages and low-adoption features that need a second look.
How the Lightning Usage App reads adoption and speed
Opening the app and the two main sections
The Lightning Usage App is the central place to watch adoption and performance for Lightning Experience. You reach it from the App Launcher by searching for Lightning Usage, and it is available with Lightning Experience without an extra license. Inside, the data splits into an Activity area and a Usage area. Activity covers who is using Lightning and what they touch, including daily active users, the most visited standard pages, the most visited custom Lightning pages, and the count of users who switch back to Classic. Usage leans into performance, with views that break down speed by page and by browser. The app pulls from the prior few months of data, so it shows recent trends rather than a full history. Because it is packaged, you cannot deeply customize the charts inside the app itself. When you need a tailored view, Salesforce exposes the underlying data through report objects, so you can build custom reports and dashboards against the same numbers. That combination, a fast packaged view for day-to-day checks plus custom reports for deeper questions, is the practical way admins use the tool.
What Experienced Page Time actually measures
Experienced Page Time, almost always written as EPT, is the performance metric Lightning uses for page loads. It measures the time from the start of a page navigation until the page settles into a usable state. The browser considers the page settled when no meaningful activity happens for about two animation frames, roughly 33 milliseconds. Activity that keeps the clock running includes network calls (XHRs), browser storage reads and writes, client-side JavaScript work, and user interactions during load. The two-frame buffer prevents a brief pause from ending the measurement too early, which keeps EPT honest about when the page is genuinely ready. Lightning renders much of the interface in the browser, so EPT is sensitive to the user's device, the browser, network quality, and how complex the page is. A record page packed with custom fields, related lists, and several components will report a higher EPT than a lean page. Because EPT reflects what the user feels rather than a single server timing, it is the number to watch when people complain that Salesforce is slow, even when server response times look fine on their own.
Four ways to capture EPT
Salesforce gives you four ways to see EPT, each suited to a different job. First, you can turn on an in-page counter that displays EPT live in the header. Enable Lightning Component Debug Mode, or add the parameter eptVisible=1 to a Lightning URL, and the running EPT appears as you click around. That is the fastest way to spot-check a single page on a single machine. Second, the Lightning Usage App shows aggregated EPT across many users, broken down by page and by browser, so you see patterns rather than one person's experience. Third, you can build custom reports against the Lightning Usage report objects, such as LightningUsageByBrowserMetrics and the page-metrics objects, to slice the data your own way and trend it over time. Fourth, customers with Salesforce Shield can use Event Monitoring and the Lightning Page View event type to get row-level performance records with rich context, including network downlink, round-trip time, and device details. Use the counter to diagnose, the Usage App to monitor, custom reports to report, and Event Monitoring when you need forensic detail on specific slow sessions.
Why custom components drive most EPT problems
When a page is slow, custom components are usually the reason. Lightning Web Components and older Aura components run in the browser, and each one that fetches data on render adds to the work the page must finish before it settles. A record page with five custom components, each firing its own SOQL query when it loads, will report a much higher EPT than the same page reading cached data or using Lightning Data Service. The fix lives in the component code and the page design, not in the Usage App. Common moves include caching query results, switching reads to Lightning Data Service so the framework shares one cache, deferring heavy components behind tabs so they load only when opened, and trimming the number of fields and related lists on the page. The Usage App and custom EPT reports tell you which pages are slow and on which browsers, which is the starting point. From there you open the page in Lightning App Builder, see which components are present, and work with the developer to reduce the per-component cost. Measuring before and after each change is the only reliable way to know an edit helped.
Where Salesforce Optimizer fits now
For years, Salesforce Optimizer was the companion tool to the Usage App. It ran a static scan of an org and flagged cleanup work, such as page layouts with too many fields, unused custom fields, and profiles with excessive permissions, then delivered the findings as a report. It is worth knowing the current state, because Salesforce has been winding the tool down. The PDF version of the Optimizer report was retired first, the in-app Optimizer experience and several of its reports have since been removed across later releases, and Salesforce lists the Optimizer app among its product retirements. The practical takeaway for an admin in 2026 is to treat Optimizer as legacy and not to build new processes around it. Much of the adoption and performance signal it surfaced is still available through the Lightning Usage App, custom reports on the usage objects, and Event Monitoring for orgs with Shield. If you inherit an org with a quarterly Optimizer routine on the calendar, plan to replace it. Lean on the Usage App for adoption and EPT, and bring in Shield Event Monitoring when you need the deeper, per-session view.
Reading the numbers as platform health
Most executives want two answers about Lightning: are people using it, and are they satisfied. The Usage App speaks directly to both. Daily active users and the most-visited pages show real usage, not seat counts. The Switcher metric, the count of users dropping back to Classic, is the clearest early warning that something in the Lightning experience is pushing people away, whether that is a missing feature or a page that feels slow. EPT trends round out the picture, because a steady climb in page time usually precedes a dip in adoption. A useful habit is to check the app on a regular cadence and pin the same few views to your executive review: active users for momentum, switcher count for friction, and the slowest record pages for the performance backlog. When a number moves the wrong way, you already know where to dig. A switcher spike points you at the pages those users abandoned. A worsening EPT on one record page points you at the components on it. Watched this way, the insights stop being a vanity dashboard and become a short list of the next things to fix.
Turn on and read Lightning Experience Insights
You do not build Lightning Experience Insights, you turn on its pieces and read them. Here is how an admin opens the Lightning Usage App, switches on a live EPT readout for spot checks, and builds a custom report when the packaged views are not enough.
- Open the Lightning Usage App
Click the App Launcher, search for Lightning Usage, and open the app. Confirm you are in Lightning Experience, because the app does not appear in Classic.
- Review Activity, then Usage
Start in the Activity section to read daily active users, most-visited pages, and the count of users switching to Classic. Move to the Usage section to see EPT broken down by page and by browser.
- Turn on a live EPT counter
To spot-check one page, enable Lightning Component Debug Mode for your user, or append eptVisible=1 to the page URL. The current EPT then shows in the header as you click around.
- Build a custom usage report
When you need a tailored trend, create a report on a Lightning Usage object such as LightningUsageByBrowserMetrics, choose your fields and date grouping, and save it to a dashboard for ongoing review.
Per-user setting in Setup that, among other things, lets the live EPT counter render in the header for diagnosis.
Quick toggle appended to a Lightning URL that displays the running EPT without changing any org setting.
Objects such as LightningUsageByBrowserMetrics that expose the same data the app charts, so you can build custom reports and dashboards.
Add-on that provides the Lightning Page View event type for row-level performance records when you need per-session detail.
- The Lightning Usage App shows only the recent few months of data, so it is for trends and current health, not long historical analysis.
- The app is read-only and not deeply customizable inside itself; build custom reports on the usage objects when you need a different cut.
- An EPT counter on one machine reflects that device, browser, and network; always confirm a pattern in the Usage App before acting.
- Salesforce Optimizer is being retired, so do not build new maintenance routines around it; use the Usage App and Event Monitoring instead.
Trust & references
Cross-checked against the following references.
Straight from the source - Salesforce's reference material on Lightning Experience Insights.
Hands-on resources to go deeper on Lightning Experience Insights.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He runs salesforcedictionary.com to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
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