The Competitive Image Format for Web 👉 WebP
Tags: webdev, design, programming, uiweekly
Published: 2021-08-13 18:33:27

WebP is image compression technology that creates smaller file sizes without compromising on quality

It can reduce the file size from 20% to 80% (or even more) compared to JPEG, PNG, and GIF

![xwebp-vs-png-lossless-compression-1120x642.pagespeed_.ic__.ayj7ulmvj-1066x611_1.png](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1628703882564/HRQRBoqJ6.png)

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### Key Features
------------

🔷 Developer by Google in 2010

🔷 Open Source

🔷 Extension -> .webp

🔷 MIME type -> image/webp

🔷 Lossless Compression

🔷 Supports Animation

🔷 Supports Alpha Transparency

🔷 Used by Google, Bind, Facebook

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### Browser Support
----------


✅ Chrome >= v9 (2011 year)

✅ Firefox >= v65 (2019 year)

✅ Opera >= v11.5 (2011 year)

✅ Edge >= v19 (2019 year)

✅ Safari iOS >= v14.4 (2020 year)

✅ Safari* >= v14 (2020 year) // Safari needs macOS 11 or later

⛔ Internet Explorer* (no native support)  // IE needs fallback/polyfill

![Screenshot_14.jpg](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1628704102124/lVEhBqnPKs.jpeg)

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### How To Use
----------

1) Using `<picture>` + `<img>` tag

```html
<picture>
  <source srcset="img/original.webp" type="image/webp">
  <source srcset="img/fallback.jpg" type="image/jpeg"> 
  <img src="img/fallback.jpg" alt="Alt Text!">
</picture>
```
**Note** This option is recommended, the browser will select its own supported format

2) Using `<img>` tag only

```html
<img src="img/fallback.jpg" alt="Alt Text!">
```

**Note** Only choose this option if you don't care about old browsers (like Internet Explorer)

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### How To Create
----------

Google has created its own package for Linux, Windows and macOS with command-line tools that can be used to transform your existing images (PNG, GIF, JPG) to WEBP format

Link: https://developers.google.com/speed/webp/download

This package includes:
* The libwebp library, which can be used to add WebP encoding or decoding to your programs.
* cwebp -- WebP encoder tool
* dwebp -- WebP decoder tool
* vwebp -- WebP file viewer
* webpmux -- WebP muxing tool
* gif2webp -- Tool for converting GIF images to WebP

**Usage** (Windows Example)
```terminal
cwebp.exe delivery_parcel.png -q 80 -o delivery_parcel.webp
```
* `delivery_parcel.png` - source file
* `-q 80` - quality param set to 80%
* `-o delivery_parcel.webp` - output file

**Online Converters**

* https://cloudconvert.com/webp-converter
* https://convertio.co/png-webp/

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### CMS & JS Frameworks Support
------------

**CMS**
- Drupal: https://drupal.org/project/webp
- Joomla: https://extensions.joomla.org/instant-search/?jed_live%5Bquery%5D=webp
- Magento: https://marketplace.magento.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=webp
- WordPress: https://wordpress.org/plugins/search/convert+webp/

**JS Frameworks** (that has optimized image component)
* NextJS
* Gatsby
* Nuxt

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### CDN Automatic Conversion
----

Some CDNs support automatic next-gen conversion of your images, like Cloudflare (although it's not a free feature and comes with a PRO plan - $20/mo)



> 
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>
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