Image Optimization

A website has around 2 seconds to load before a visitor is prepared to leave, according to a number of studies. Mobile users might be a little more patient, but as phone speeds rise, their tolerance for slow-loading websites on a phone declines.

Additionally, Google considers it important because users favour faster websites. Google has made a significant effort to concentrate on issues that matter to its users. In this article, we’ll look at what image optimization is and how you can optimize the images you upload to your website.

What is Image Optimization?

Optimizing web images is the process of delivering high-quality images in the correct format, dimension, size, and resolution while maintaining the smallest possible size.

Image optimization can be accomplished in a variety of ways, including image scaling, caching, and size compression. Enter ImageKit, an intelligent picture optimization application that uses an intelligent compression technique to optimize images.

Image optimization aims to produce high-quality photographs with the smallest possible file size. Here, three key components are involved:

•         Image size (JPEG vs. PNG vs. WEBP images)
•         Image size and resolution
•         Image compression level

You can decrease the size of the image and enhance website performance by striking a balance between the three.

What are the Benefits of Image Optimization?

Improve Site Speed

The time it takes for a web page to fully load is known as page load speed. It relies on a variety of variables, including your website host and the style and design of your website. The websites that load in under two seconds are the ones that users prefer the most.

To make web pages load more quickly, there is image optimization for both desktop and mobile. For shoppers, they improve the shopping experience. Your bounce rate can rise by 103% if your website loads slowly by even two seconds.

With a quicker user experience on your website, more people will interact with your goods and services. There are a variety of tools available to you that can assist you in measuring the speed at which your web page loads, including ImageKit’s Website Analyzer, Web Page Test, and Google’s PageSpeed Insights.

Improve Search Performance

Images that have been optimized make it easier for users and search engines to understand your website and to find your information online. According to recent research, 32% of Google search searches yield photos. The ability to rank your photographs in Google’s Image Search can increase traffic to your website and help you establish your brand.

In the modern world, every digital marketer is aware of the significance of search ranking. Who wouldn’t want their website pages to rank highly? And one of the contributing aspects to this is how quickly your website loads. Image optimization is therefore very important in this context.

Boost Conversions

As a result, if your search ranking increases, you can potentially attract more users and increase conversion rates. Conversions and SEO ranking are directly correlated with page load speed.

Marketing authorities like Kissmetrics, Moz, and others have conducted a ton of research on the connection between conversions and page load times.

Better User Experience

The user experience of a visitor depends on page speed. Delays as small as 1/10th of a second can be felt by people. Anything beyond that doesn’t feel “immediate” to me. One second is all it takes for a person’s mental process to be disrupted.

Longer loading times are associated with higher bounce rates and shorter average time on the page. The user experience would be enhanced if page load times are lowered even by a single second. Search engine rankings are positively impacted by improved user engagement and interactions with your site, which can increase engagement, conversions, and customer retention.

How to Optimize your Images?

The main objective of image optimization is to strike a compromise between the smallest file size and usable quality. Almost all of these optimizations can be done in more than one method. Simply compressing them before uploading them to WordPress is one of the most widely used methods. Usually, a program like Adobe Photoshop or Affinity Photo can be used for this. Using plugins, some of these tasks can also be completed.

Lossy/Lossless Image Compression

Lossy uses inaccurate approximations and partial data discarding to represent visual content. In order to reduce file size and preserve as much of the image’s quality as possible, several image file types, including JPGs, interpret colour pixels and reduce part of the image’s information.

This filter reduces the size of the data. While there is no quality loss, rendering will be delayed and the photos must first be uncompressed. On your PC, you can conduct a lossless compression using programs like Photoshop, FileOptimizer, or ImageOptim.

To determine which compression method is most effective for each image or format, it is best to experiment. Make careful to save the image for the web if the option is available in your tools. Many image editors have this feature, which will provide you with the quality modifications you need to carry out the best compression. By experimenting, you can achieve the optimum balance possible without sacrificing image quality.

Choosing Image File Type

JPEG, PNG, SVG, and WebP currently make up the majority of file formats used on the internet. There are GIF files as well, but they aren’t advised for producing high-quality photographs for your website. They have really been reduced in recent years to being used in animations, and even then, due to their size, they are becoming less and less common to upload to a website.

•         JPEG: Because the colour-containment pixels in an image have the potential to contain millions of different colours, JPEG (.jpeg, commonly written as.jpg) files are ideally suited for photographs taken with a camera or camera phone. Despite the fact that a photo may contain a lot of colours, JPEGs excel at maintaining tiny file sizes.
•         PNG: When you’re storing a graphic with few colours, PNG format is recommended. Images that would employ the.png file type include logos and icons. PNG produces higher-quality images, but also has a larger file size
•         SVG: Web designers have access to the SVG format, which enables them to use vector-quality pictures. The majority of other file types used on the web are raster (pixel-based) formats that rely on the colour information they include at the size they are intended to be shown.
•         WEBP: Google developed the cutting-edge WebP picture format to offer greater lossless and lossy compression for web image optimization. WebP images offer the greatest features of JPEG and PNG formats at a lesser file size because they also support transparency.

 Using Image Optimization Tools

There are various optimization tools available that you may use to compress the photos on your website. While many optimization programs charge a fee for their premium capabilities, some of them are free. You can use the following tools to effectively prepare your images for the web:

•         Affinity Photo
•         Adobe Photoshop
•         Gimp
•         Paint.NET
•         GIFsicle
•         JPEGtran
•         JPEG Mini
•         OptiPNG
•         Pngquant
•         FileOptimizer
•         ImageOptim
•         Triage
•         ImageResize.org

The advantages of image optimization are too important to ignore. These advantages go beyond just page load time and SEO standing. With image optimization, you can increase sales and conversion rates. Your site will perform better in search engine results, load faster for readers, and be more well-liked by browsers, networks, and search engines once you’ve formatted your photos for improved performance.