Optimizing Images for Your WordPress Website

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Want to know the fastest way to speed up your WordPress site? Optimize images for WordPress! Huge, uncompressed images are one of the top reasons websites load slowly, and it’s one of the easiest things to fix.

There are two things that really slow down a website: a bad host and huge pictures. The hosting talk is for another day, though I recommend BigScoots Hosting (it’s what I use for my sites and my clients’ sites). Today we’re tackling the image side of things!

Why You Need to Optimize Images for WordPress

Before we jump into the how, let’s talk about WHY this matters so much.

When you upload a photo straight from your phone or a stock photo site, that image can easily be 3 to 8 MB. Some are even bigger! For reference, your ENTIRE web page should ideally be under 2 to 3 MB total, images included. So one unoptimized photo can be bigger than your entire page should be.

What happens when your images are too big? Your site loads slowly, visitors leave before the page even finishes loading (Google says most people abandon a page that takes more than 3 seconds), your Google rankings drop because page speed is a ranking factor, and your hosting storage fills up faster.


In General:

1. Try to keep image size under 400kb if possible.
2. Upload images in the jpg (or jpeg) format unless transparency is necessary (then use png).
3. Keep max image width around 1200 unless the image will be used as a full screen background.
4. Use an image-squishing plugin to squeeze the most out of your optimization.  (For example, https://shortpixel.com/)

Here are my steps for working with a photo.  I’ll give an example of a photo used from deposit photos.  This is an extreme situation.  Most of your photos will start much smaller and will be easier to work with.  I will do both with and without Photoshop.  Photoshop makes it so easy! Before optimizing my file was 5.9MB AGH!! Do NOT upload those huge files to your site!

How to Optimize Images for WordPress with Photoshop

If you have Photoshop, this is the easiest and fastest way to optimize images for WordPress. Here’s my exact process.

1. Open the file in Photoshop.
2. Go to File > Export > Save for Web (Legacy).
3. Choose JPEG and adjust the quality slider (I usually use 60 to 80, which looks great and keeps file sizes small).
4. Set the width to 1200 pixels or less.
5. Save and upload to your website!
6. Let ShortPixel (or your compression plugin) squish it even further.

See the process here: (from 5.9 MB to 114 KB!)

How to Optimize Images for WordPress Without Photoshop

Don’t have Photoshop? No problem! There are free tools that do a great job.

1. Resize the image using a free tool if it’s extremely large. I like Simple Image Resizer or you can use the built-in Preview app on Mac (open the image, go to Tools > Adjust Size, and set the width to 1200 or less).
2. Compress the image by uploading it to TinyPNG. Despite the name, it works on both PNG and JPG files. It’s free for up to 20 images at a time.
3. Download and upload the compressed file to your WordPress site.
4. Let your compression plugin do a final pass. ShortPixel will catch anything you missed!

See the process here: (from 5.9 MB to 247 KB!)

What About WebP and AVIF Formats?

You might have heard about WebP and AVIF and wondered if you need to worry about them. The short answer: not really, because ShortPixel handles it for you!

WebP and AVIF are newer image formats that produce smaller files than JPG with the same quality. WordPress supports both. When you use ShortPixel, it automatically converts your images to these formats and serves the right one to each visitor’s browser. You just upload your JPG like normal and the plugin does the rest.

Setting Up ShortPixel (My Recommended Plugin)

ShortPixel is the image optimization plugin I use on my own sites and on all my clients’ sites. It automatically compresses every image you upload, converts to WebP/AVIF, and has a bulk tool to optimize all your existing images at once. It gives you 100 free image credits per month, and their paid plans are very affordable if you need more. Try ShortPixel here!

“If ShortPixel compresses my images, why should I bother resizing first?” Great question! Even though ShortPixel compresses images, resizing them first still matters because compression reduces file size, not pixel dimensions. Uploading oversized images means browsers may still download more pixels than needed, especially on mobile, which slows page loads. Resizing images before upload reduces the total data from the start, lets ShortPixel compress more efficiently, and results in faster-loading pages with less bandwidth use. Pre-resize + ShortPixel together = the best results.

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