The graphics you see over the internet are typically image files. Almost everything you see around is derived from a simple image file. There are various image formats for web design and developments available. However, all these years, we have worked either on JPEG or GIF formats when it comes to web design services.
But did you know that there are a lot of other formats that can be used for website design and development? Well, there are many image formats for web design and development available. But are rarely known so far. These new image formats bring something new for the web development company designing a website.
So, which one to choose from? GIF, JPG, PNG, or something else for the website design? To help you out, we’ve compiled a list of some of the best image formats for web design and development. Let’s take a look at it.
- JPG/JPEG: JPEG is regarded as a widely used picture file format. As it offers 224 or 16,777,216 colors, digital cameras are the principal devices that use to save photographs. This format is perfect for web graphics because it also provides several levels of compression.
The majority of social media platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, automatically convert uploaded image files to JPEGs. For sharing images, JPEG (sometimes known as JPG) is a lossy compression raster image file format. Lossy refers to the fact that while using JPEG, the file size and image quality are both reduced.
Even though JPEGs perform well when compressed, there is typically a slight quality loss once photos have been optimized. However, it all depends on the image’s chosen level of compression. Unless you look extremely closely, the quality decreases are frequently not apparent.
JPEGs, on the other hand, are not ideal for photos with little to no color information, such as screenshots of user interfaces and other straightforward computer-generated graphics. Therefore, web design service providers often try to avoid it when designing websites.
- PNG: PNG is a file format for keeping color contrast, detail, and lossless image compression. Particularly when compared to the JPEG platform, PNG offers substantially greater text readability. As a result, PNG is a more popular option for infographics, banners, screenshots, and other graphics that combine text and images.
A PNG file is compressed without loss, which means that when the file is decompressed for viewing, all picture information is recovered. Users benefit from higher quality (lossless) photos and text that is easy to read.
When you need to keep the sharpness of an image with quick color changes, PNGs work fantastically. For instance, it is much better to use PNGs when capturing a screenshot of a user interface where various interface elements strongly change between dark and light backgrounds. And therefore, it is one of the most preferred image formats for web design and development.
- SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics): The Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format, also referred to as a markup language, allows for the immediate rendering of two-dimensional pictures on a web browser. It employs XML language to outline shapes and lines similar to how mathematical equations make graphs rather than pixels like a raster format does. This implies that SVG images can be scaled up indefinitely without losing quality.
Small file sizes and loss-free scaling of things like straightforward graphics, shapes, and text are perfectly appropriate for this platform. It is not the best choice for pictures or intricate sketches. Logos, icons, easy graphics, and everything else you want to be freely scalable with your responsive design work really well with SVG.
- GIF (Graphic Interchange Format): Another kind of raster image file is the GIF image file format. GIFs employ lossless compression, which preserves the quality of the images. GIFs, on the other hand, use indexed color to store image data, which limits the number of colors that can be present in a normal GIF image to 256.
GIFs are not the best format for storing digital photographs like those from a digital camera because they may only have 256 colors. Photos stored in the GIF format frequently appear grainy and unnatural, even when using a custom color palette and applying dither to smooth up the image.
While GIFs are more appropriate for website buttons and banners due to their ability to accommodate millions of colors, the JPEG format is more frequently employed for digital photo storage.
On the other hand, once the animation has been encoded into the actual GIF file, it cannot be altered. As a result, you must make sure you have the source data before you start. If you don’t, you might have to start from scratch if you wish to make little adjustments to an existing GIF file.
- WebP: The cutting-edge image format WebP is renowned for providing the best lossless and lossy compression for photos on the web. WebP allows webmasters and developers to make richer, more compact images that speed up the online. WebP lossless images are 26% smaller than PNGs when compared in size.
Comparable JPEG images with the same SSIM quality index are 25–34% larger than lossy WebP images. To put it simply, WebP offers fewer files for the same or higher image quality, but not all browsers and image editors support it.
WIX and Editor X have selected the WebP image file platform to provide customers with smaller photos of the same quality and lossless and lossy compression. Unfortunately, WebP only works with the most recent versions of Chrome and Firefox.
- HEIC/HEIF: There has been an evolution in this image format in two main directions. The first is that, among the numerous picture formats, the file container provides the broadest feature set. A crucial component of HDR, multi-focus, or photos with numerous viewpoints, it is capable of enabling multi-frame images that have multi-frame compression.
The second is that it offers substantial adaptability and supports a variety of non-image data formats. The majority of these images are compressed using a derivative designed for images from the H265/HEVC video codec and use this container. These have been designed to work with the 4K and 8K resolutions, which are the ones that most modern displays have.
HEVC coding has fewer constraints than JPEG but more highly sophisticated procedures. Increased coding times are required to compensate for its higher compression efficiency, but this is not a problem in any web-related activities.
There isn’t a single image format that functions well in every circumstance. There are benefits and drawbacks to each image format. The overview, advantages, and disadvantages of each image format, as well as when and when it should be utilized, are all summarised above for your consideration. Want help with web design? Hire web designers in India from us or visit Pixlogix now!
