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How can you optimize Images for Web Performance without Losing Quality

Did you consider optimizing your photos prior to uploading them to WordPress can have a huge impact on your website speed?

When starting a new blog, many beginners simply upload images without optimizing them for web. Images that are large can make your website slower.

You can fix this by employing the image optimization best methods in your daily blog routine.

Within this article In this post, we will show you how to optimize your images to increase web performance but without sacrificing quality. We will also provide automatic optimization plugins for images. optimization applications for WordPress which can simplify your work.

Since this is a thorough guide on image optimization for the web so we've put together an easy-to-follow table of contents:

  • What's the definition of image optimization? (optimized vs unoptimized images)
  • What makes image optimization crucial? What are the advantages?
  • How do you store and optimize images for web performance?
  • The best image optimization tools and software
  • Top images optimization software for WordPress

What is Image Optimization? (Optimized vs Unoptimized Images)

Image optimization is the process that saves and delivers images with the smallest files without reducing the overall quality of images.

Although the process might sound complex however, it's really quite simple today. You can make use of one of the numerous image optimization programs and tools to automatically compress images by more than 80% and without any visible degradation in image quality.

Here's an example images versus unoptimized:

As you can see, if properly optimized, the same image can be 75% smaller than its original size without any degradation in quality.

What is Image Optimization work?

In simple words simple terms, image optimization utilize compression technologies such as "Lossy" and "Lossless" which helps reduce the overall size of the file without causing any loss in quality.

What does it mean to optimize Images?

If you've ever been given an offer to optimize images from your WordPress hosting support or by a speed test tool, then it is that you should reduce the file size of your photos by optimizing them for the web.

Why is Image Optimization Important? What are the Benefits of Image Optimization?

While there are many benefits of optimizing your pictures, below are the most significant ones to be aware of:

  • Speedier website loading
  • Improvements in SEO rankings
  • Higher overall conversion rates for leads and sales
  • A smaller amount of storage and bandwidth (which can reduce hosting and CDN cost)
  • Faster website backups (also reduces the cost for backup storage)

In addition to video, images are the second most hefty item on a web page. In accordance with HTTP archive pictures account for approximately 21% of the weight of a page's total.

Because we know that fast websites rank higher in search engines (SEO) and also have higher conversion rates images optimization is something every business website should do should they wish to make a mark online.

Now you might be wondering how big of a difference can image optimization actually create?

According to an Strangeloop study, a one-second delay in the speed of loading your website can cost you 7% in sales. It also results in 11% fewer pageviewsand a 16 percent decrease in customer satisfaction.

If none of these reasons are enough to speed up your website it is important to understand that search engines such as Google provide preferential SEO for faster loading sites.

This means that by optimizing your web-friendly images you will be able to improve speed of your site as well as increase WordPress SEO positions.

Video Tutorial

If you'd prefer written instructions, just keep reading.

How to Save and Optimize Images for Web Performance?

The key to successful photo optimization that is optimized for performance on websites is to find the best balance between the smallest file size and acceptable quality images.

Three factors that play an important importance in picture optimization are:

  • Image file format (JPEG vs PNG vs GIF vs tiff )
  • Compression (Higher compression = smaller file size)
  • Image Dimensions (height and width)

By selecting the most suitable combination of these three, you can shrink your image's size by as much as 80 percent.

Let's look at each one in more details.

  1. Image File Format

For the majority of website owners, the only three images formats that really have any significance comprise JPEG, PNG, and GIF. The selection of the proper file type can be crucial to image optimization.

To keep things simple For simplicity, it is recommended to use JPEGs for photos and images that have a lot of colors. PNGs for straightforward images or for transparent images, and GIF for images that are animated only.

For those who aren't aware of what is the difference between each type, the format of PNG images is uncompressed which means it's an image of higher quality. image. The downside is that PNG file sizes are significantly larger.

However, JPEG is a compressed file format which slightly reduces image quality in order to deliver a substantially smaller file size.

However, GIF only supports 256 colors along with lossless compression which makes it the most appropriate choice when it comes to animated photos.

On WPBeginner, we use three different image formats based on the type of image.

2. Compression

The other thing is image compression that plays an essential part within image optimization.

There are many types and levels of compression available. The settings for each will differ based upon the image compressing tool you select.

The majority of image-editing tools like Adobe Photoshop, On1 Photo, GIMP, Affinity Photo and many more have built-in image compression capabilities.

You could also save your images in the normal way and then utilize a web tool like TinyPNG or JPEG Mini for easier image compression.

While it's not the most user-friendly These two methods permit you to compress your images prior to uploading them to WordPress as well, which is what we do with WPBeginner.

There are many well-known WordPress plugins like Optimole, EWWW Image Optimizer and many more that automatically compress images when you first upload them. Many newbies, and even larger corporations are using these image optimization plugins because they are simple and efficient.

We'll provide more information about these WordPress plugins in the following article.

3. Image Dimensions

Normally, when you import a photo from your phone or digital camera an extremely high resolution as well as massive file dimensions (height and width).

Most often, these images have the resolution of 300 DPI and sizes that range from 2000 pixels or more. These high-quality photos are well-suited for desktop or print printing. These images are not appropriate for use on websites.

A reduction in file dimensions to something less limiting can drastically reduce the size of images. You can easily resize images by using an image editing software on your personal computer.

We optimized, for instance, photos with 1.8 Megabytes as its original file size The image has a 300 DPI resolution, and image dimensions of 4900x3200 pixels.

The format we chose was jpeg for greater compression. We also changed the dimensions to 1200x795 inches, and it reduced the file size to 103 KB. That's 94% less than the original size.

Now that you know the three primary factors that affect image optimization We'll take a look at different images optimization techniques for website owners.

Best ImageOptimization Tools and Programs

As we have mentioned previously, most image editing software come featuring image optimization in addition to compression adjustments.

Outside of the software for editing images, there are many powerful and affordable image optimization tools that you can make use of to improve images for websites (with only one or two clicks).

We suggest making use of these tools for optimizing images before uploading them to WordPress especially if are an expert.

This method will help you save memory on the WordPress hosting account, and will guarantee the fastest image and the finest quality because you manually go through each image.

Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is a premium software that comes with the option of saving images that have been optimized for use on the internet. Open your image and click on"Save for Web. "File >> Save for Web" option.

This will open a brand new dialog box. On the right, you can select different image formats. For JPEG format, you'll get a range of quality options. If you choose your preferred options it will also give you the size of the image on the bottom left.

GIMP

GIMP is a free and open-source alternative to the popular Adobe Photoshop. It is a tool to help you optimize your images for use on the web. The drawback is that it is not as easy to utilize as other solutions on this list.

First, you need to open your image in GIMP and then click File > Export to option. This will show the dialog box for saving your file. You can give your file a new name, then click an export option.

This will show options to export images. For JPEG files, you can select the compression level to reduce file size. And finally, click on"Export" button in order to save optimized images.

TinyPNG

TinyPNG is a web-based application that employs a clever lossy compression process to decrease in size your PNG images. All you have to do is go to their website and upload your images (simple drag & drop).

They compress the image they will give you the download URL. You can also use their sister web site called TinyJPG to use JPEG image compression.

They also have Extensions for Adobe Photoshop that we employ as part of our editing process for images because it brings together the best features of TinyJPG with TinyPNG within Photoshop.

For developers, they have an API that converts images automatically. For novices, they offer the WordPress plugin that will accomplish the task (more on this in the future).

JPEG Mini

JPEGmini uses a lossless compression technique that significantly reduces the size of images but without affecting their perceptual quality. You can also compare the quality of the original image and the compressed image.

You can access their web version for no cost, or purchase the program for your computer. They also offer a paid API that can automate the process on your server.

ImageOptim

ImageOptim is an Mac program that allows users to reduce images, without sacrificing any quality. It works by identifying the most efficient compression parameters and remove unnecessary color profiles.

Windows option to do this would be Trimage.

Best Image Optimization Plugins for WordPress

The best method of optimizing your images is to do it prior to uploading images to WordPress. But, if you're running multi-author websites or require an efficient solution then you could consider using a WordPress image compression plugin.

Here is our list of the best WordPress image compression plugins:

  1. Optimole an extremely popular plugin created by The Team behind ThemeIsle.
  2. EWWW Image Optimizer
  3. Compress JPEG & PNG images using the plugin developed by the TinyPNG team, which is mentioned in the article.
  4. Imagify - a plugin from the well-known WP Rocket plugin team.
  5. ShortPixel Image Optimizer
  6. WP Smush
  7. reSmush.it

Using any from these WordPress image optimization plugins will allow you to improve the speed of your website.

Final Thoughts and Best Practices for Image Optimization

If you aren't saving images that are optimised for web, it's time to begin doing this right now. It'll make a significant difference on your site speed as well as your customers will be grateful for it.

Not to mention, faster websites are ideal for SEO and you will likely see an increase in your search engine ranking.

Make use of this tool convert to png

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