Compress Images for Web

Next-gen image formats are particularly effective when you want to compress images for web. How effective? If an ordinary uncompressed JPEG is the starting point and benchmark, then when you compress an image for web and use an optimized JPEG, JPEG 2000, WebP, and AVIF via a device-aware image CDN, you can get the results shown above.

Clearly the compression algorithm used by the next-gen image formats are more effective. However, finding the right settings for compression when you optimize image for web is not always easy. For example, you do not want to compress so much that image artifacts like pixelization start to appear. The goal is to compress the image to a level that is just above the perceptible difference on any given device. For example, a new iPhone with an excellent screen and high pixel per inch ratio will show artifacts much faster than a low-end Android device with a low-density screen. When you optimize image for web, you should optimize according to the requesting device’s capabilities and whether it supports a particular image format.

In terms of identifying what is perceptible, it is useful to calibrate using a Structural Similarity Index like DSSIM. ImageEngine engineers have used DSSIM to optimize an image for web without any perceptible degradation in quality.

Web designers often compress image for web when trying to improve the conversion rate and revenue generated by websites. But first, you need to get visitors to your website.

How do you drive more people to your website? By improving how you rank on search engines. You want to be on the high onthe first page. The click-through rate for ranking on the top of Google's first page for a keyword is 23%, versus less than 2% for listings on the second page.

How much can compressed images for web boost SEO rankings? In the case of several ImageEngine customers such as Masarishop, they reduced image file sizes by up to 80% and rose to the first page on important keywords.

It turns out that if you compress images for web, then your performance improvements will drive a higher ranking by search engines like Google. Search engine ranking is driven by a wide assortment of variables. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) practices include a number of best practices like keywords frequency, backlinking, establishing website authority. However, web performance, or as Google likes to call it Core Web Vitals, is also a factor. And image optimization is a key factor in your Core Web Vitals score. In a competitive industry where websites are competing for that top rank, if you compress images for web, then you may edge out your competition. And if you use a best-in-class service like ImageEngine, you may establish a competitive advantage via Core Web Vitals scores that others cannot match.

Core web vitals is a new scoring system from Google that will start in 2021. Together with “page experience signal”, Google will use these scores to promote websites that develop better user experience characteristics like mobile-friendliness, load time, and more. You can read a detailed explanation here.

The three core web vitals are:

• LCP (Largest Contentful Paint)
• FID (First Input Delay)
• CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift)

LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) is the most impacted score when you compress images for web.

Older speed measurement metrics like Time to First Byte (TTFB) or First Contextual Paint (FCP) did not correspond to what a user sees on the screen while interacting with the page. When it comes to website speed, then what matters the most is how much time it takes for a user to interact with the largest content on the page. LCP measures this and is dramatically improved when you optimize image for web.

LCP measures a web page’s load time from the users’ perspective. In other words, it determines the time consumed for loading the largest content (text, image, or video block) on the screen right after the user has requested the URL.

So, how do you know if the LCP score of the website is good, average, or bad? According to the specific LCP guidelines of Google, the LCP speed of the website can be categorized into any of the following three ratings:

• Good (if the largest content on the page loads within 2.5 seconds)
• Needs Improvement (if the largest content on the page takes more than 2.5 seconds but less than 4 seconds to load)
• Poor (if the largest content on the page takes more than 4 seconds to load)

The most important thing for improving the page experience quality of a website is image optimization. The large image placed on the homepage of a website is often the LCP (Largest Contentful Paint). If you do not compress this image for web, then the LCP score will be low because of slow loading.

By compressing image for web, an image CDN like compress images to the right size and right format without affecting the quality of the image. It will also take into account whether you need lossless or lossy compression. Compressed images not only improves the loading time of a web page but also provides the much-needed SEO advantage. Implementing next-gen image formats like AVIF and WebP formats will bring the best quality while keeping images at a small file size. The good news is that the majority of the popular browsers extend support to these modern formats.

Developers or web content managers often fail to find the balance in file size and format while compressing their images. This problem will not longer be a hurdle when the companies will optimize for the core web vitals. For this purpose, the experienced development team at ImageEngine can provide a wide range of robust solutions for optimizing images. The ImageEngine team puts an image CDN service into the web application that takes care of converting the images to next-gen image formats (having the best quality at low file size) like WebP, AVIF, etc. and then serves them to popular browsers.

ImageEngine optimizes web images to provide companies of all sizes with a competitive SEO advantage. The in-house experts at ImageEngine understand how Google’s search engine behaves and interprets the image when ranking the URLs.

For example on ImageEngine’s own site, when we optimize image for web using our own ImageEngine solution, the score improved from the low 20s up to the 90s. For many websites, ImageEngine can put scores in the 90s within your reach.

ImageEngine’s image CDN service reduces the loadtime of the website, which initiates a string of events. When the site performance and speed are elevated, then the bounce rates are reduced. It’s important to control the bounce rates because, according to Google, if the loading time is increased from 1 second to 3 seconds, then the bounce rate will shoot up to 32%. Also, if the loading time is increased from 1 second to 6 seconds, then the bounce rate will jump to 106%. This is bad not only for your business but for search engine ranking also. Once the bounce rates are under control, then the website engagement and user experience progress to improve the probability of additional conversions.

The end result is a more successful business as well as a better ranking on the search engine. This is what the team at ImageEngine strives to achieve so that your eCommerce business grows with a perfect blend of technology and experience.

ImageEngine optimizes web images to provide companies of all sizes with a competitive SEO advantage. The in-house experts at ImageEngine understand how Google’s search engine behaves and interprets the image when ranking the URLs.

For example on ImageEngine’s own site, when we compress image for web using our own ImageEngine solution, the score improved from the low 20s up to the 90s. For many websites, ImageEngine can put scores in the 90s within your reach.

ImageEngine’s image CDN service reduces the loadtime of the website, which initiates a string of events. When the site performance and speed are elevated, then the bounce rates are reduced. It’s important to control the bounce rates because, according to Google, if the loading time is increased from 1 second to 3 seconds, then the bounce rate will shoot up to 32%. Also, if the loading time is increased from 1 second to 6 seconds, then the bounce rate will jump to 106%. This is bad not only for your business but for search engine ranking also. Once the bounce rates are under control, then the website engagement and user experience progress to improve the probability of additional conversions.

The end result is a more successful business as well as a better ranking on the search engine. This is what the team at ImageEngine strives to achieve so that your eCommerce business grows with a perfect blend of technology and experience.

Frequently, website operators claim, “We have a responsive website we’re ready for mobile first indexing.” Then, once tested on Google's PageSpeed Insights, the site scores below 30.

Until recently, performance is not a priority for most websites. On average, websites take 8 seconds to load a page. How is 8 seconds fast? The ideal page load time for an online retail website is 2-3 seconds.

To achieve this level of performance a complete solution of not just compression of images, but also CDN delivery is requrired.

With a solution like ImageEngine and attetion to blocking javascript and cumulative layout shift, most websites can dramatically improve their PageSpeed Insights score.

“We have a CDN thanks, we don’t need another one.” Then how are your images being optimized? They’re not? Google and other experts agree that since more than 50% of payload is images, then cutting image payload and thereby getting images to load faster is one of the best ways to improve web performance.

ImageEngine’s Content Delivery Network (CDN) helps its customers cut seconds off page load time, improve SEO, reduce bounce rates, and most importantly, increase revenues.

It does this by combining three critical services: device detection, image optimization, and a CDN. ImageEngine will immediately detect the requesting device and browser at the CDN’s edge server. It will then fetch the original image and resize, compress, and convert the image to an optimal file format for the device. Finally, it will deliver the image via its CDN. Subsequent requests deliver an optimized image from the CDN cache.

When you reduce the file size of your images so that images load faster could also save you money on your current CDN, improve core web vitals and in turn give you better website ranking on Google. A multi-CDN strategy allows organizations to combine two or more best-in-class services to create a unified network that serves a global audience. A multi-CDN strategy equates to less latency, greater redundancy, and more scalability.

Some well-known brands say “we don’t care about organic ranking or page loading times. Our customers know who we are and can easily find our website by searching our name.” So, our question to them was, then you have 0% bounce rate then? “Ermmmm no it’s 30%” So how much percentage is correlated to bad user experience from the result of slow page loading times. If you improved your web performance by optimizing your images to next gen format, reducing your image payload, reducing your largest contentful paint and improving page speed, speed index, then you can be assured that web performance is not impacting bounce or conversion rates. In August 2021, these improvements will help with customers and Google’s evaluation of your site. Surely, these improvements are worth looking at.

Good content will always win. Now this is correct. If the page has killer content, and it’s the best page for the user relevancy-wise, it will still rank well (even if the Page Experience scoring is low). But in a highly-competitive eCommerce category, great Core Web Vitals scores can make a difference.

In August 2021, Google will update its algorithm to include the new Core Web Vitals as part of its SEO ranking signals. This means that if both you and another website provide quality content to users, your competitor could outrank you if they provide a faster website —specifically if they score higher on their Core Web Vitals.

So, our advice is let us help you with image optimization. If you run Page Speed Insights and see the following warnings and opportunities, then you are a good candidate for an image CDN:

• Poor First Contentful paint
• Poor Speed Index
• Poor Largest Contentful Paint
• Poor Time to Interactive
• Opportunity: Serve images in next-gen formats
• Opportunity: Efficiently encode images
• Opportunity: Properly size images