Matt Cutts from Google has recently let the world know that the time it takes for your website to load does not directly impact Google’s PageRank technology except in those instances where the site is timing out on Google’s end and they are not able to retrieve information from your website for indexing your website as a result. Basically, if your site takes more than about 30 seconds to load for a 56K browser, this should be considered as too slow in my opinion.
However, Matt did mention two key factors that should be taken into consideration for the future.
First, Larry Page has mentioned that the company could potentially be going in that direction in the future. This makes sense typically because less graphically instensive websites are more user friendly and easy to navigate.
Secondly, potential customers just do not have the time to wait 20 to 30 seconds for your website to load. Your site can still have graphics and load quickly. The last thing you want to do is drive people away from your website because they are frustrating at how slow it is loading and keep in mind some people still live in the 56K modem days and connect to wifi with 1 or 2 bars!
