Image optimization on your WordPress blog should not be overlooked. In addition to enhancing the user experience, this practice enables increased efficiency of SEO strategies. In this article, we’ve put together 12 simple ways to optimize your images. Check out!
The production of material for blogs is one of the practices most used by companies investing in Content Marketing. This is a great channel to diversify the type of post, integrating the text with videos, gifs, images and the like.
Visual content is crucial to the visitor experience, so optimizing images in WordPress directly influences the effectiveness of the strategy.
Ignoring this step is detrimental to SEO, as it may delay page loading, make it difficult to see content, and thus result in search engine ranking.
So that you don’t face this kind of problem, we have written this article with 12 essential plugins for optimizing images in WordPress. Check out!
1. Imagify Image Optimizer
The Imagify is very celebrated for its interface, considered aesthetically appealing and intuitive use. From the homepage, you have access to everything the tool has to offer, which makes the experience simple and efficient.
The main functionality of the plugin is image compression without changing the quality. For this you need to use the compression level indicated as normal. There are two other levels: aggressive and ultra.
Because these levels are more powerful, they minimally alter the quality of visual content , but in turn dramatically reduce its size. The plugin also has an interesting option: all images sent to the library are automatically optimized, making the process much more effective.
Pricing is based on the size of the files you want to compress. Thus, there are monthly plans with a minimum of $ 5 for 1GB and a maximum of $ 69.99 for 50GB of data per month.
2. Optimole
The Optimole Image Optimization plugin is 100% cloud based, which means it doesn’t overload your server. Its operation is largely automatic. Just create your account, upload the images you want to optimize and the plugin will do the rest of the work.
Personalization, of course, is also possible. Once Optimole performs automatic optimization, you gain access to images in the Dashboard, where you can modify file size, quality, and other characteristics.
The tool provides the ability to track and monitor images, bringing detailed information about the optimization process and the amount of space is saved.
How much?
If you want to treat less than 1GB per month, good news: the service is completely free. If you need more space, you can hire one of the following plans:
- personal: $ 9 per month with a 10GB limit;
- business: $ 29 per month with 50GB limit;
- custom: over 750GB per month with a matching value.
3. Smush Image Compression and Optimization
One of the most popular plugins on the market, Smush is proud to have twice won the best compressor and image optimizer competition . The app offers the option to optimize both old and new photos. This ensures that even images posted for some time will benefit.
Smush allows the user to optimize an unlimited number of images at no charge as long as they do not exceed 1MB each. If that is not enough, you will need to pay $ 49 a month to get the PRO version.
4. EWWW Image Optimizer
Of all the plugins listed, EWWW is perhaps the least attractive interface. Still, the application stands out for allowing the optimization of JPG, PNG, GIF or PDF files . You can opt for more aggressive compressions that alter image quality; or less aggressive, which maintains the original quality.
Unlike many other competitors, EWWW Image Optimizer performs optimizations on its own server, avoiding the waste of time when transferring collections from one server to another.
Also, the app is completely free . The only case in which you would need to spend money would be if you wanted to use another server for the optimization process, which is not necessary.
5. ShortPixel Image Optmizer
The ShortPixel presents an interface very similar to the Imagify but adds some flaps for advanced features. From the moment you install, all images uploaded to your library will be automatically optimized.
You can also enable bulk optimization, which deals with previously posted images.
ShortPixel offers a monthly courtesy of 100 free images. If you need more than that to power your site , there are a variety of plans. The most affordable is $ 4.99 and allows you to upload up to 5000 files.
6. Compress JPEG & PNG images by TinyPNG
Looking for a basic and efficient plugin? The TinyPNG may be the solution. With an extremely simple interface, you only need a few seconds to locate and get started.
TinyPNG does not set a size limit for each optimized file and offers 500 free uploads per month. After that, each image will cost 9 cents.
7. CW Image Optmizer
By processing all images on its own server, CW Image Optmizer ensures fast loading of your site and reduced use of broadband resources.
Like other plugins in the list, CW allows automatic optimization of all new files as well as those that existed before their installation. The difference of this alternative is the application of Littleutils, a well-known Linux tool that brings improvements to your WordPress experience .
8. Optimus
Optimus focuses its services on optimizing large files without losing quality. According to its developers, it is possible to achieve up to 70% reduction of the file, its characteristics.
Once enabled, the plugin uploads all images to their own server before returning them with their new sizes. Because this optimization occurs in the background, the work of the site developer is not interfered with at all.
Because every good service provides data for your evaluation, Optimus tells you how much of each image has been reduced, letting you know how efficient the procedure was. The plugin has a free version with no upload limit but restricts each file to a maximum of 100 KB.
9. SEO Friendly Images
As the name suggests, this plugin has full focus on image optimization for SEO, ie search make them more attractive to search engines. How is this done? The SEO Friendly Images works directly with the ALT and TITLE attributes of an image.
ALT is the short description of your image for the search engine and therefore a key factor for ranking in image searches. But the TITLE is simply the title of the picture that will be displayed to users, making it easier to understand.
With the installation of the plugin, the ALT and TITLE attributes of all images are optimized to rank better in search engines. In addition, images that do not have such attributes will be automatically updated so that they can be included.
10. Imsanity
Do you usually upload huge images and have difficulty resizing them manually? Here is the solution. The Imsanity is configurable to limit the height, width and quality of the images.
If one of your uploads exceeds the set limits, the plugin will automatically resize the file.
11. Hammy
If you have any notion of digital marketing, you know how important a site ‘s responsiveness is to maintain visitor engagement. This concept has to do with being able to view content on any device, whether it’s a desktop or a smartphone. Hammy was developed to make your site more responsive.
The plugin takes your images and creates versions of various sizes. That way, when a visitor comes to your page, they see the version that is most appropriate for the screen they are using. This is a crucial factor for user satisfaction, especially for mobile access.
12. Media File Renamer
Another plugin that gives full attention to SEO optimizations is Media File Renamer. With it, you can easily change the title of your media, which may be needed to improve your search engine ranking.
Best of all, the tool automatically changes the links of these files to existing posts. That way, you only need to focus on finding the most appropriate title, knowing that the rest will be done by the application.
The need to optimize images in WordPress is due to its influence on the user experience and the application of SEO techniques. Quality images are essential for entertaining and engaging visitors to a site, but they need to be loaded quickly to avoid damaging their experience or ranking at Google.
Thus, using one of the plugins presented throughout the text, you have the opportunity to give the consumer pleasant navigation. In addition, by strengthening SEO, you can improve your Inbound Marketing approach.
So, ready to optimize your WordPress blog images? If you want to continue to gain knowledge, we recommend this free ebook that offers a WordPress guide to corporate blogging. Come on!