You use Webmaster Tools, right? If you rely on Google traffic in any way shape or form you really should be using it.

It’s an invaluable service and it just got better with the addition of a new, performance specific feature. From the Google Webmaster Central blog:

Now we bring data and statistics specifically applicable to your site. On Site Performance, you’ll find how fast your pages load, how they’ve fared over time, how your site’s load time compares to that of other sites, examples of specific pages and their actual page load times, and Page Speed suggestions that can help reduce user-perceived latency. Our goal is to bring you specific and actionable speed information backed by data, so stay tuned for more of this in the future.

I know what you’re thinking. How fast is this site?

Performance overview

On average, pages in your site take 0.4 seconds to load (updated on Nov 30, 2009). This is faster than 97% of sites. The chart below shows how your site’s average page load time has changed over the last few months. For your reference, it also shows the 20th percentile value across all sites, separating slow and fast load times.

Fast, but there’s always room for improvement. 99th percentile, I’m looking at you.