Big image files are the single most common reason a web page feels slow. A modern camera phone can happily produce an 8 MB photo, yet the same picture on a website rarely needs to be more than a few hundred kilobytes. The good news is that learning how to compress images takes about a minute, costs nothing, and, with our tool, never involves handing your photos to a server. Everything below happens on your own device.
Our compressor runs entirely in your browser using the real libwebp encoder compiled to WebAssembly. That means your pictures are processed locally and are never uploaded. It is free forever, needs no sign-up, and adds no watermarks. Here is exactly how to use it.
How to compress images in five steps
- Open the compressor. Head to the home page to launch the tool. There is nothing to download and no account to create, so it is ready the moment the page loads, on desktop or mobile.
- Drop or select your images. Drag your files onto the drop zone, or tap it to browse your device. You can add one photo or a whole batch at once. It accepts JPG/JPEG, PNG, GIF, WebP, AVIF, TIFF, BMP and SVG.
- Let it make lossless and lossy versions in four sizes. For each image the tool automatically produces a lossless and a lossy (quality 80) WebP, at four sizes: Original (100%), Small (−25%), Smaller (−50%) and Smallest (−75%), always preserving the aspect ratio with high-quality resampling.
- Compare file sizes and pick your favourite. Every version is labelled with its exact file size, so the saving is obvious at a glance. Choose the smallest option that still looks crisp for where you plan to use it.
- Download individually or as a ZIP. Save any single version with one click, or use Download All to collect your whole batch in one tidy ZIP, perfect when you have optimised a folder of photos in one go.
Choosing the right size for the job
The fastest way to reduce image file size is often to send fewer pixels. A photo does not need to be 4000 px wide to sit in a blog post that is 800 px across. Match the output to where it will live:
| Where it goes | Suggested size | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Website hero / banner | Original or Small | Needs to stay sharp on large, high-density screens. |
| Blog body image | Small or Smaller | Rarely displayed wider than the text column. |
| Email attachment | Smaller or Smallest | Keeps you under inbox size limits and loads fast. |
| Social thumbnail | Smallest | Platforms re-compress anyway, so start lean. |
Lossless or lossy: which should you pick?
Because the tool shows you both, you can simply choose the smaller file that still looks right. As a rule of thumb, reach for lossy for photographs and detailed scenes, since the quality-80 setting is visually indistinguishable from the original in most cases and shrinks files dramatically. Choose lossless for logos, screenshots, line art and anything with sharp edges or flat colour, where you want every pixel preserved. Our guide to lossless versus lossy compression explains the trade-off in more depth, and the WebP vs JPG vs PNG comparison shows why WebP usually wins on size.
Batch tips for compressing many images
If you are optimising a gallery or a product catalogue, drop everything in together rather than one file at a time. Pick a consistent size across the set so your layout stays even, then export the lot with Download All. This keeps your work tidy and makes it easy to compare before-and-after totals for the whole batch. Working with a specific format? See our dedicated guides on how to compress JPG files and compress PNG files, or how to convert images to WebP.
Compressing images on your phone
The tool works the same on mobile browsers. Tap the drop zone, choose photos from your camera roll, and everything is processed on the handset itself, so nothing is sent anywhere. That makes it genuinely handy when you are out and about and need to shrink a photo before emailing it or posting it, without installing yet another app or worrying about your data leaving the phone.
Why compress at all?
Smaller images mean faster pages, happier visitors and better search rankings, since page speed is a ranking signal. They also save bandwidth for people on mobile data and slip comfortably under email size limits. Because our compressor is 100% private and free forever, there is no reason not to make it a habit before you publish. More features, including AVIF export and finer control over metadata, are on the way, but the essentials above will already cut most files by well over half.
Ready to try it? Open the compressor and drop in your first image.