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How to Troubleshoot Slow Application Performance

If you notice that pages are taking longer to load or the application feels less responsive, this guide outlines a systematic approach to help you gather the necessary information for effective troubleshooting.

Understanding performance challenges begins with determining whether the slowdown stems from your local network environment, regional latency, or an application-related factor.

Step 1: Assess Local Network Conditions

Begin by examining potential local influences:

  • VPN or Proxy: If you are connected via a corporate VPN, proxy, or firewall inspection tool, try disconnecting temporarily and retest the application. These services can introduce additional latency or restrict certain connections.
  • Network Activity: Ensure your internet connection is stable. Pause any significant downloads, streaming, or backup processes on your network to avoid bandwidth competition.
  • Alternate Network Test: If available, switch to a different network (such as a mobile hotspot) and observe the application’s performance. Improvement on an alternate network may indicate issues with your local configuration, ISP, VPN, or firewall.

Corporate Network Considerations

If you’re connected through a corporate network, VPN, or secure web gateway, performance can be affected by security and routing controls.
These are common in large organizations and can add 100–500 ms of delay per request without any issue in the application itself.

How to Check

  • Compare performance on VPN vs. off VPN (or from a mobile hotspot).
  • If you notice a large improvement off the corporate network, the issue likely lies in routing or inspection layers within your organization.
  • You can still collect diagnostic data (HAR files and network traces) from both conditions to show the difference.

What to Provide to Support

If you’re within a corporate environment, please include:

  • Whether you were on a VPN, proxy, or firewall at the time
  • The name of your corporate security solution (if known — e.g., Zscaler, Palo Alto Prisma, Cisco Umbrella, Netskope, etc.)
  • A HAR file and network trace from both your corporate and non-corporate connections if possible
This helps us isolate whether the performance differences are caused by network routing or the application itself.

Step 2: Capture a HAR File

A HAR (HTTP Archive) file captures detailed information about how your browser loads each page element, providing valuable insights for diagnosing performance issues.

  1. Open your browser (Chrome or Edge).
  2. Press F12 or select More Tools > Developer Tools from the ⋮ menu.
  3. Go to the Network tab.
  4. Check Preserve log.
  5. Reproduce the performance issue in the application.
  6. Click the Export HAR icon to save the file locally.
  7. Attach the .HAR file to your support request.

For more information see: Generating a HAR file for troubleshooting

Step 3: Conduct a Network Trace

Network traces reveal the routing path between your location and the application servers and can highlight potential latency or routing concerns.

Windows (WinMTR):

  1. Download WinMTR.
  2. Enter the application hostname (e.g., example.crtportal.com).
  3. Click Start and allow it to run for five minutes.
  4. Click Stop, then export to Text or HTML.

MacOS/Linux (mtr):

  1. Open Terminal.
  2. Run: 
    mtr -r -c 100 app.yourcompany.com > mtr_results.txt
  3. Attach the resulting output file to your support request.

For more information see: How to Run a Network Trace

Step 4: Provide Context

Including contextual information with your support ticket helps our team correlate logs and assess whether issues are regional or specific to certain workflows. Please include:

  1. The local date and time when you observed the issue.
  2. The specific page(s) or actions that experienced slowness (e.g., logging in, saving records, running reports).
  3. Whether you were connected to a VPN or proxy at the time.
  4. Example users, entities, or records affected, if applicable.

Step 5: Submit your Findings

After you have gathered all relevant information, submit your results to Cyturus Support by opening a new ticket or replying to an existing one. Please include:

  1. The HAR file
  2. The WinMTR / mtr / pathping results
  3. The contextual details from Step 4

Once received, our support team will review the collected network and server performance information and provide targeted guidance or recommended next steps.

By following these steps, you help ensure a thorough and efficient resolution process.