Performance is a product feature

Short summary

An argument that performance should be treated as a first-class product feature, not a deferred non-functional requirement. The article cites well-known data points (Amazon's 100ms=1% revenue, Google's 3-second abandonment) and argues performance regressions compound invisibly over time. It recommends setting SLOs on P50/P95/P99 latency, treating performance budgets like test coverage, and celebrating performance wins publicly to build culture.

• •Performance is a product experience, not a technical afterthought—addressing it late is exponentially more expensive
• •Regressions compound: 20ms per commit becomes 1.9s over 18 months with no single villain
• •Practical steps: SLOs on P50/P95/P99, performance budgets on PRs, observability for all engineers

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