What is the primary benefit of implementing lazy loading in a web application?
Lazy loading is a performance optimization technique that primarily benefits web applications by reducing the initial bundle size and improving page load time. It works by: 1) Loading only the essential code and resources needed for the initial page render, 2) Deferring the loading of non-critical resources until they are actually needed, 3) Reducing the time-to-interactive for users, and 4) Saving bandwidth by potentially never loading resources that the user doesn't access. This is particularly important for large applications where loading all code upfront would significantly impact initial load performance.