Images are a big part of the web and the biggest challenge is to properly optimize and deliver it. If you are a web designer, or a developer who is striving to reduce the image file size? You must know about Google's solution to this problem - WebP.
As part of Google's initiative to make the web faster, WebP was provided by Google. It is designed to use a more aggressive and better optimized compression algorithm than JPG and PNG with the objective of reducing file sizes with minimal quality loss. This means faster websites consuming less bandwidth.
What is WebP image format?
WebP is an emerging image format put out by Google. Developed by Google, WebP basically is a derivative of WebM video format. WebP is an incredibly useful format because it offers both performance and features.What does WebP stand for?
A WEBP file is an image saved in the WebP (pronounced "Weppy") raster image format developed by Google for web graphics. It has file extension as, .WebP .History of WebP
First released in 2010, WebP now has a capacity to use both lossy and lossless image compression in order to create images that are smaller and richer without decreasing the loading speed of website.Features of WebP
- WebP adopts both lossy and lossless compression.
- WebP lossy images are potentially 25-34% smaller than JPEG.
- WebP lossless images are potentially 25% smaller compared to PNG.
- WebP supports lossless transparency, i.e. PNG with alpha channel.
- WebP supports animation. i.e. animated GIFs.
- In a nutshell, WebP is capable of significantly reducing JPEG, GIF, PNG’s image file size.
What is WebP good at?
Faster websites consuming lesser bandwidth is the biggest advantage of using this Image format.Especially the thumbnails are the perfect starting points for WebP conversions. The website visitors will experience faster loading time.
What is WebP bad at?
One of the drawbacks of this image format is that any animation saved as WebP requires more processing power during playback compared to a good old GIF animation.Serve WebP images in Blogger
You may not be able to upload the WebP format through blogger but you can definitely serve WebP format through image url (transform on the fly).1. Upload your image to post.
2. Change post to html editor
3. Find your img tag.
4. For example, your src is like this:
https://2.bp.blogspot.com/xxxxxxxx/xxxxxxxx/xxxxxxxx/s1600/ramdom-image.jpg
5. Just look for letter s following some number (size of picture).
6. Add -rw suffix to it like this: https://2.bp.blogspot.com/xxxxxxxx/xxxxxxxx/xxxxxxxx/s1600-rw/random-image.jpg
Check for WebP
To confirm whether the images are in WebP format or not,- After the -rw addition process, Go to the blog post page.
- Save the post’s image in local device.
- The image gets saved in WebP format.
Test the WebP efficiency,
- Visit the Google Pagespeed tool before the -rw addition process.
- Test for your site speed.
- Visit the Google Pagespeed tool after the -rw addition process.
- Test for your site speed.
Thus we can confirm that WebP format can reduce any image file size more than standard JPEG compression while maintaining similar or better image quality without decreasing the loading speed of the website.