Optimizing images & using a CDN has become essential for online publishing.
A few days back, I talked about the best image compression WordPress plugins where I highlighted some great solutions for compressing images on your blog.
But not everyone is using the WordPress platform for their website. Many of us are blogging on various other platforms like BlogSpot, Tumblr, or something else.
What’s the best image compression solution for these users?
Well, this is where online image compression tools come into the picture.
When you search online for photo compressor tools, you will be awestruck by the sheer number of tools available. To make your work easier and save you some time, I’m listing some of my favorite tools that you can use right now to compress images & make them web-ready.
- (Note: A few of the listed tools also support compressing .pdf files which is useful for those who are selling eBooks online.)
Question: Why do you need to compress images?
The main reason is to lower down the loading time of your blog as this has a direct correlation with search engine ranking.
If your page takes more time to load, your competitor can outrank you based on similar quality content, but a faster loading time.
It’s important to note that having images on our blog posts are very useful as they improve the visual experience & make our content more media rich.
At the same time, to stop images from slowing down the loading time of our pages, we can use a few techniques:
- Compress images without losing quality.***
- Use high-quality hosting for your website.
- Use a Content Delivery Network.
- I recommend using MaxCDNÂ with a WordPress blog.
When in doubt, you can use any of these page loading time testing tools to see how fast or slow your website is loading.
***In this article, we will talk about compressing images.
- Note: If you are using WordPress for running your blog or website, you should use one of these image compression plugins instead.
6 Best Online Tools for Compressing Images (without losing quality):
1. Compressor.io
I love this one as the UI is very modern. It makes compressing images fun!
You can export compressed images using Dropbox or Google Drive. It supports the compression of 4 image formats:
- JPEG
- PNG
- GIF
- SVG
You will want to bookmark this for future use.
2. Kraken.io
This is one of my favorites as you can compress multiple files in one go.
Simply drag & drop.
What’s really cool here is that you can download all of the compressed files into a .zip file with single click.
I have been using it for a while & highly recommend it.
Below you can see the amount of data saved by the Kraken.io image compressor:
3. GiftOfSpeed .PNG Compressor || jpg compressor
When I was researching online image compression tools, I landed on the GiftofSpeed website.
This is one place which offers many tools that any webmaster can use to test various dimensions of their website.
This is another easy to use online image compressor site.
You should also use their image delivery tool to see if images on your blog posts or websites are well-optimized. It will also suggest things that you can do to further optimize your site.
Here is the result from one of my recent blog posts:
In my case, I always compress my images using ImageOptim (Free for Mac). At times, I run a batch image compression in WordPress using a plugin.
You should go to GiftofSpeed and take a test for your site to see how much KiB you can save by compressing images. This will give you a good idea of which image compressor tool/WordPress plugin you should be using.
4. Tinypng
This is one of the oldest & most well-known websites for compressing images online.
Tinypng also offers a WordPress plugin & a Magento extension that you can use to compress images without the hassle of manually uploading & compressing images on their website.
Supports:
- PNG
- JPG/JPEG
The free account lets you compress roughly 100 images/month.
To use this plugin you need to get an API key from here.
5. OptimiZilla
I really like this one as you can compress an image based on your desired level of quality.
The instant preview lets you compare your original image to your compressed image & you can set your desired compression level from this preview.
This is useful when you are compressing a huge image & want a way to control quality loss.
It uses the best optimization and lossy compression algorithms to shrink JPEG and PNG images to the minimum possible size while keeping the required level of quality.
- It supports bulk upload & bulk compression.
- You can upload up to 20 images.
(You should also know about OptimiZilla’s sister converting site called Toepub. This lets you convert .pdf files into various formats for free. eBook authors will find Toepub very useful.)
6. ImageRecycle
This is another great image & .pdf compression tool.
You can use its online compressor tool for free and developers can use its API to build their own compression tool.
It supports multiple CMSs using their API. Right now, they have a WordPress plugin, Shopify app, Joomla Extension, and a Magento extension.
You can create a 14-day free trial with a 100 MB quota.
They also have an interesting offer for bloggers who can write about their service in order to get 2 months of access with a 3GB quota. I believe 3GB is good enough for many of you to compress all of the images in your media library.
- You can learn more about their referral program here.
Over to you:
These are some of my favorite online web apps to compress images without losing quality.
I seldom use them for projects which are not related to WordPress or blogging, but you can use them however you like.
Now, it’s your turn to contribute. Let us know your favorite image optimization tools in the comments section below.
If you’ve enjoyed learning about these tools, show your love by sharing this post on Facebook & Twitter.
Here are some hand-picked articles to help you get more out of your images:
- 5 Powerful Reasons To Add Images To Your Blog Posts
- 10 Absolutely Free Websites To Download Stock Images
- How To Do Image Optimization for SEO
- How To Perform a Reverse Image Search
This is a good article @Harsh. But I use image optimizer by Dynamic drive
I use Compressor.io and it is awesome 🙂 I use it with Wp Smush and get good results.
For my blog, i use TinyPNG online tool for image compression and it works great.
TinyPNG plugin also available free.
Wp smush and compressor.io also best choice.
#Harsh Sir This is good Article. But which image compression plugin should i Install. For WP blog.
Hey haider,
You can use WpSmush.it
Dear Harsh. I am thankful that you made this blog for bloggers. I am new to the internet world and surprisingly I found you to guide me in a right direction. As you mentioned in one of your post “WordPress Plugins That Powers ShoutMeLoud To Success”, I have been using “Smush It” plugin for image optimization and it truly worked out. Now after reading this valuable article, I am excited to try these tools for sure.
Everyday I learn something new from you and your blogs. Thanks once again for being there for us…
Hey Vijay,
I am really elevated bu those words. Glad that you liked Smush it.Thanks for sharing your experience.
Hi,
Actually I am using “Caesium Image Compressor” and its by far the best and most flexible Image compressing software I have used. And its completely free!
But, I will also try the other tools that you have mentioned here.
Thanks for the nice article!
Nice article Harsh. I always use TinyPNG and I can say that it is one of the best free online image compression tools.
Hi Harsh, This is a great and very useful article for those who are using more images on their blog or website. I am using online site jpeg-optimizer.com for Image compress but this is only for JPEG format.
Thanks a ton!!
Swapnil
Hi Harsh, thanks for the post. The name of the tools that you have mentioned works perfect to compress image. But is it necessary to compress an image before uploading it to WordPress if I am using a WP plugin like WP Smush? Cause the main purpose of these plugin is to compress image. Please suggest.
hey Harsh..!! These tools are really best to compress any image online. specially i loved Compressor.io ,its really a one click process and yeah I’m totally agrees with you that it have made the image compression fun.
I just wanna suggest one more awesome image compressor tool which is ‘Compress Now’, I usually use this and this is really very helpful.
BTW thanks a lot for this useful post.
Thank You..!!
Hirsh Sir, Hmm, image compression is a must task to speed up our blogs. Here you shared awesome online compression tools. Thanks for sharing.
Hi Harsh, thanks for this valuable post… I was worried about to compress my images before I upload, it sucks blog load speed… But now after reading this post I can compress my images…
thanks for this post….
Thanks Harsh for updating this awesome post. earlier smush it was a good plugin to compress images but after it nothing was there. I manually compress images. These tools are really helpful for image optimization.
Thanks again!
~Abhishek
This is a good article @Harsh. But I use image optimizer by Dynamic drive.
Dear Harsh,
This is indeed a good list of image compressors. But it happens that I have not used any of them for image resizing or compressing purposes. I have been using http://www.reduceimage.com for this purpose. May be this will merit your visit to see if it’s a good tool for us. In coming days, I will try using your recommended tools.
And one doubt: when I search for such tools, I get image reducers as well as image compressors. Are they one and same? And my friend is of the view that image resizer will reduce the image quality whereas image compressor doesn’t. What’s your say on this? Thanks
The basic difference between resizing & compression is that resizing chnages the physical dimensions and resolution of an image while compressor uses some algorithm to reduce file size without loos of visual quality (depends on the amount of compression applied).
It all depends on the purpose. You won’t need a 300 dpi image for your blog (too high in size & heavy) and a 72 dpi for your brochure design (too low in quality). I hope this helps
Hi harsh, I use Fotor and it is quite good.
I am using WP-Smush plugin which seems me perfect for image compression without loosing quality.
Best guidance over image compression. I was bit confused about choosing online compression tool; this will help me for better workings.
Thanks a ton!!
Hey, does anyone have an idea how can I compress Vimeo videos on my WordPress website?
Hi Harsh, I am regular reader of your blog and love it. You explained image compression here only for CMS blogs but I am searching image compression for my html site. Is there any way to optimize it?
@Sugandha
These tools are online & works for HTML & any other kind of site. Kindly read the description again.