What's a good Cumulative Layout Shift?
A good Cumulative Layout Shift is 0.10 or lower — Google's 'good' threshold: 0.1 or less at the 75th percentile. Measures unexpected layout shifts during page load. Excellent is 0.05 or lower (Karbon target), and the minimum acceptable tier is 0.25 or lower (Google's 'poor' line: over 0.25 at the 75th percentile).
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The three tiers Karbon grades against — and where each comes from
| Tier | Value | What it means | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Minimum | 0.25 | The floor. Below this, something is broken. | Google's 'poor' line: over 0.25 at the 75th percentile |
| Recommended | 0.10 | The tier a healthy campaign should hit. | Google's 'good' threshold: 0.1 or less at the 75th percentile |
| Excellent | 0.05 | Top-tier performance worth defending. | Karbon target |
| Published threshold | 0.1 | Google's Core Web Vitals 'good' threshold, 75th percentile. Source (2025-05) | |
Lower is better for this metric.
Why Cumulative Layout Shift matters
Layout shifts cause misclicks and erode trust. A CLS above 0.25 means users are literally clicking the wrong buttons because elements jump around.
Sources
The three tiers on this page are Karbon Agency's grading targets. These published figures are the outside reference points for Cumulative Layout Shift, so you can check our tiers against them.
- web.dev (Google) — Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) (April 12, 2023; read September 26, 2026)A CLS of 0.1 or less is good; greater than 0.25 is poor.
Where does your Cumulative Layout Shift land?
Karbon Agency grades every client campaign against these exact tiers, live on a dashboard — no guessing, no quarterly PDFs.