It is not a secret that people are captivated by eye-catching visual media. Statistics show that large and high-quality images are a significant factor in drawing users’ attention. Now, that is all great, but typically images form around 21% of the total web page size. Therefore, if you do not want to have a bulky, slow-loading website, you have to learn how to reduce the file sizes of your images as much as possible without interfering with their quality. Fortunately, optimizing your images is one of the easiest and straightforward tasks to perform, which will positively impact several essential aspects of your website.

As a web hosting provider, HostArmada understands how critical the loading speed is for every website owner. Therefore, we have implemented intelligent caching systems on a server level intended for static file caching, which show a dramatic reduction of the loading time. Combined with well-optimized images, the result will be blazing fast performance.

Benefits of Optimizing your Images

The loading speed of your website is a significant factor affecting your visitors’ experience and your SEO ranking. Many website owners tend to neglige the importance of compressing images, which can notably increase the loading period of their website and consequently frustrate users. Optimizing your images brings the following general benefits:

• Shorter page loading time – Naturally, as smaller the images are in size, the faster the website page is loaded. This directly affects your visitors’ experience while they are interacting with your site. A quickly loaded page will positively increase their satisfaction and overall impression of your brand.
• SEO improvement – Search Engines do not like slow websites. The page loading speed is a search engine ranking criteria, therefore, reducing the loading period will consequently impact your SEO and help you rank higher.
• Fewer resources required – Formatting your images will save your web hosting resources – smaller files require less storage and generate less bandwidth.

If you are a newly started photographer or love making your images crispy and sharp, we recommend checking FixThePhoto.

Their photography post-processing services can turn a seemingly moderate photo into state-of-the-art and distinguish you from your competitors!

Image Compression Tools

Image compression tools and software are used to reduce the value of transmission and storage size of images. There are many available online and offline, free, and paid software you can use to optimize your images. Some of them allow you to manually adjust the image, while others automatically perform the task for you. To shorten up the list and help you choose the most suitable and convenient tool for your individual needs, we have reviewed the best tools for 2020.

Before we step into reviewing the tools, we would like to explain the difference between the two compression types.

• Lossy – This method allows you to significantly reduce the file size by eliminating parts of the data. It can degrade the images, so you have to be careful with it.
• Lossless – This method compresses the data without interfering with the image quality.

Online Tools

TinyPNG

TinyPNG is one of the oldest and widely used free web-based image compression tools. It uses intelligent lossy techniques for reducing the file size of JPEG and PNG images. It allows you to upload up to 20 images at a time, and up to 100 a month with their free version. The maximum file size per image is 5 MB. TinyPNG automatically compresses the images by converting CMYK to RBG and no visually noticeable loss in the image quality. JPEG images are compressed by 60%, while PNG images by 80%. When the compression is completed, you are provided with an archive to download on your local device.

Apart from the web version, TinyPNG has ready to use WordPress plugin and Magento extension, which you can easily integrate into your website.

The downside of TinyPNG is the size limitation and the inability to adjust the quality reduction.

 

Compressor.io

Compressor.io is another excellent free online image compression tool. It allows you to compress JPEG, PNG, GIF, SVG, and WebP files in three modes – Lossy and Lossless with the free version, and Custom with the pro version. Among its advantages are its flexibility and the ability to reduce up to 90% of the file size. The file size limit is 10 MB. The process is automated and as simple as dragging and dropping the desired file.

The downside of Compressor.io is that it does not allow bulk image compression, you can optimize a single image at a time. If you need to compress a lot of images, the task can become really time-consuming.

 

Kraken.io

Kraken.io is a truly powerful image compression tool, which comes with free and pro versions. It supports JPG, PNG, and GIF formats and allows you to optimize up to 20 images at once. When the process is completed, you will be provided with a downloadable archive containing all files. Compared to the previous two tools, Kraken allows you the option to export the files to Box, and import your files directly from Box, DropBox, and Google Drive, as well as from your device. Kraken.io has three compression modes – automatic Lossy and Lossless modes, and manual Expert mode, which grants extra flexibility.

In their Pro version, you will find some truly impressive features, such as unrestricted upload image size, image resizing, Kraken Cloud storage, access to their API, including integration to WordPress and Magento, and more.

The major downside of Kraken.io is the limitation of 1MB per file with the free version.

 

Optimizilla

Optimizilla is a free online tool that significantly reduces file sizes without sacrificing quality. Optimizilla supports JPEG and PNG file formats and allows you to compress up to 20 images at one go. It uses a smart lossy compression algorithm and provides you with a .zip file of all images when the process is completed.

One of the great features of Optimizilla is the option to select the compression rate and control quality adjusting. Furthermore, it allows you to preview the compressed images and compare them to the originals.

 

CompressNow

CompressNow is a flexible web-based tool that allows you to control the compression level. With CompressNow, you can optimize up to 10 PNG, JPEG, GIF, or JPG images in bulk. The file limit of this tool is extended to up to 9 MB. The ability to control the compression rate by percentage is among the great advantages of CompressNow, especially if you want to apply the same rate for multiple images at once.

 

Offline Tools

FileOptimizer

FileOptimizer is free and reliable compression software for Windows OS. Its interface is intuitive, and it supports various file formats, including GIF, JPEG, and PNG. You can add images as simple as dragging and dropping them, and you will be presented with a comparison between the original image size and the size of the compressed copy.

FileOptimizer replaces the original copy with the compressed one by directing it to the Recycle Bin. Even though it can be recovered if needed, this could be inconvenient for some users.

Trimage

Trimage is a free compression cross-platform for Unix-based OS. It utilizes high-level lossless compression, and it removes EXIF and other metadata for the best possible results. It has a GUI as well as a command-line interface. It is simple and intuitive to use, and it allows you to compress PNG and JPG files without compromising their quality.

ImageOptim

ImageOptim is a free image compression software for Mac. It uses lossless image compression and removes bloated metadata for the best ratio between size reduction and quality loss. With an intuitive and simple drag-and-drop interface, you can compress multiple images. The process is automated, so it does not require any advanced knowledge. ImageOptim combines various optimization tools to grant the highest possible JPEG, PNG, GIF, and SVG file size reduction.

Final Words

Optimizing your images is something you definitely do not have to neglige and overlook. As you can see, this is a relatively simple task, and finding the most suitable tool for your individual needs can make it less time-consuming and effortless. Combining image compression with the general practice for image optimization, such as using vector images along with JPG and PNG images, using CSS3 effects instead of images, implementing lazy-loading images, replacing text within images with web fonts, and using CDN for serving your images, will lead to a drastic improvement in the loading speed of your website.