Recommendations: Structuring content for performance
Content structure has a direct impact on publishing and editing performance in SitecoreAI. Structures with large numbers of items or complex relationships can significantly increase processing time during publish and authoring operations.
Design your content model with performance in mind to avoid issues at scale.
How structure affects performance
Publishing and editing operations must evaluate:
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The number of items involved
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Relationships between items (for example, references and dependencies)
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The shape of the content hierarchy
As these increase in size or complexity, the amount of processing required also increases.
Large numbers of items
Content trees with a high number of items under a single parent can slow down operations.
Non-optimal patterns:
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A single node with thousands of direct children
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Large, flat structures used for organisation or navigation
Recommended approach:
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Group items into logical subfolders
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Break large sets into smaller, manageable segments
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Avoid placing more than 150 items under a single parent node
Relationships between items
Fields that reference many items increase the amount of work required during publishing and editing.
Non-optimal patterns:
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Multilist or reference fields with very large numbers of linked items
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Highly connected content where items depend on many others
Recommended approach
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Limit the number of referenced items where possible
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Avoid creating large, highly connected networks of content
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Consider alternative modelling approaches for large datasets
Summary
To maintain good publishing and editing performance:
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Avoid large numbers of items under a single parent
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Limit the number of relationships between items
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Prefer segmented, organised structures over wide, flat hierarchies
Designing your content structure with these considerations helps prevent performance issues and reduces the risk of delays during publishing.