So, you’re building a WordPress website. You know images are important, but what size image to use on WordPress can be confusing. This guide simplifies image sizes for WordPress, covering dimensions, file sizes, and optimization, so your site looks great and loads quickly.
When I started with WordPress, images were a constant struggle. Uploaded pictures would look blurry, stretched, or take forever to load. Understanding image optimization transformed my site, and it can do the same for yours.
WordPress Image Sizes: A Simple Guide
Two main factors determine what size image to use on WordPress: image dimensions and file sizes. Let’s explore each of these in detail.
Image Dimensions
Image dimensions, measured in pixels (px), refer to an image’s width and height. For example, a 1200 x 630 px image is 1200 pixels wide and 630 pixels tall.
The right dimensions depend on the image’s location on your site and your overall website design. Appropriate image dimensions enhance user experience.
For specific recommendations, refer to the table in the “Best Practices” section. Consider the thumbnail size, large size, and other default WordPress image sizes.
File Sizes
File size, measured in kilobytes (KB) or megabytes (MB), is the space an image occupies on your server. Smaller files load faster.
Shrinking file size often involves image compression, which can affect quality. Careful optimization balances file size and image quality.
Consider different image formats like JPEG and PNG, and remember smaller files lead to improved page loading speed.
Why Image Size Matters for Your WordPress Site
Correct image sizes directly impact site speed, SEO, and user experience.
Site Speed
Site speed is critical. Nearly half of visitors expect a site to load in under two seconds.
Slow loading, often caused by large images, can drive visitors away. A fast-loading website leads to better user experience.
SEO
Search engines favor fast-loading pages. Large images slow down loading times and hurt your search engine ranking.
Optimizing image sizes boosts SEO and improves your site’s visibility in search results.
Also, the image format and aspect ratio can contribute to better optimization. If you are looking for an SEO agency to help take your WordPress website to the next level, contact us today!
User Experience
Large image files frustrate users. Slow-loading images lead to a poor user experience, causing visitors to leave.
Optimized images enhance the overall quality and speed, leading to more engaged visitors.
What Size Image To Use On WordPress: Best Practices
There’s no universal “perfect” image size for WordPress. The ideal size depends on your specific website’s design and content.
Check your theme’s guidelines, consider your post image size, and don’t be afraid to experiment. Default image sizes can also help optimize loading images.
General Image Sizes
| Image Type | Recommended Dimensions (pixels) | Target File Size (KB) |
|---|---|---|
| Blog Post Images | 1200 x 630 | < 200 |
| Featured Images | 1200 x 900 (landscape) 900 x 1200 (portrait) | < 200 |
| Header/Banner Images | 1920 x 1080 or smaller, maintaining 16:9 aspect ratio | < 300 |
These dimensions provide a starting point. WordPress offers responsive images, adapting to different devices. Default size options and default image size often accommodate varying devices well.
If smaller images work perfectly on your website, maintain those dimensions for better engagement and faster loading. Ensure text size accommodates the images and consider accessibility for users with varying vision.
Custom Image Sizes in WordPress
WordPress generates default image sizes to maintain website image quality while minimizing the file size and upload image steps. For the average website owner this is perfectly acceptable, ensuring your pages load faster for website users regardless of the screen size. This automated functionality gives a very good quality to each of your web page users while optimizing the various WordPress image sizes so that they’ll all look very high resolution and good. This makes regenerating thumbnails quick. Using these defaults, and keeping a small default image size will allow users to stay engaged with faster loading content, and will help determine the proper header image size. While these may create what you believe to be an image with an unusual aspect ratio, these sizes and shapes are well tested and will render well on almost all sizes of screens. So consider sticking with the defaults unless there is something very specific to your situation.
If default sizes are insufficient, you can resize images. Tools like Cloudinary offer extensive control over image dimensions, file sizes, and optimization. They can even manage featured image size. It offers a WordPress plugin for easy integration.
Optimizing Images for WordPress: Essential Tips
Choosing the right dimensions is only the first step. Optimizing images ensures they look sharp and load quickly. The default WordPress image sizes are designed for optimal performance. But if those do not work for you there are additional optimization methods.
Compression: Your Secret Weapon
Image compression reduces file sizes without significantly impacting quality. Tools like TinyPNG simplify this process.
Compression balances file size and image quality for optimal performance. It is important when selecting a blog post image, featured image size or a default image size. Be mindful of the aspect ratio of these image sizes when considering different screens for the post image to be rendered on.
Lazy Loading: A Performance Booster
Lazy loading defers image loading until they are visible in the viewport. This significantly improves initial page load times.
WordPress has built-in lazy loading functionality, optimizing image delivery. Using it is very easy to do, all of the documentation for lazy loading images can be found in the WordPress Developer documentation.
Lazy loading is essential for pages with many images. It enhances user experience by prioritizing above-the-fold content.
Choosing the Right Format
Use the correct image format for different image types:
- JPEGs: Ideal for photos with many colors. The logo image should likely not be JPEG, although the larger file size, the high quality might look more suitable, than other logo image formats..
- PNGs: Best for images with sharp lines, like logos and illustrations. For the logo image size the format that likely will perform the best will be a PNG file, due to how it handles lines.
- GIFs: Use for simple animations, but generally avoid them for other image types.
Making Edits After Uploading to Your WordPress Site
WordPress offers basic image editing tools within the Media Library. You can crop, rotate, flip, and scale images. Be cautious though, WordPress image sizes do not include vector files.
For more advanced editing, consider plugins. Remember that using custom image sizes may require regenerating thumbnails.
WordPress Plugins and Resources for Images
Several plugins enhance image management in WordPress. Consider your custom image sizes, and any compression needed, you might also want a custom image size. Plugins and online tools make image optimization easier:
- EWWW Image Optimizer: Automates image compression. It can also regenerate thumbnails and handle many types of image formats and file sizes.
- Smash Balloon Social Photo Feed: Integrates Instagram images into your WordPress site.
- BulkResizePhotos: Resizes images quickly and efficiently.
Conclusion
Choosing the right image size for WordPress is crucial for site performance and user experience. Optimize your default image sizes and remember default image size might impact SEO and UX.
Consider dimensions, file sizes, compression, lazy loading, and image formats. Testing different approaches helps find the optimal balance. Prioritize user experience and accessibility on all devices.
Don’t be afraid to experiment and refine your strategy over time. Finding the perfect balance will lead to a visually appealing and high-performing WordPress website. Our WordPress SEO services can help gain your website to the next level, give us a call today!
