What to Consider When Optimising Your Images for Sharing Across Different Platforms
Images are the most popular type of content on the web. They're great for grabbing people's attention, but not all images are optimized for sharing on social media and other platforms. The good news is that you can easily optimize your images so they look good and load quickly across any platform!
What is image optimization?
Image optimization is the process of optimizing images for the web. This can help improve the speed and performance of your website, as well as ensure that it's optimized for SEO and user experience.
The main reason we optimize images before uploading them to our site is so they're properly sized to fit on different platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ etc. It's important to make sure you're including good quality photos since social media platforms often limit how big an image can be in terms of bytes (size). If you have large images stored somewhere else on the internet but only want a small part of it then there are tools like Bufferapp which will allow you to download just those parts from anywhere across the web so that all your posts look uniform across all networks!
Image file types
When you’re sharing images on social media, it’s important to keep in mind the image file type. You can choose between JPEG, PNG and GIF.
JPEG is the most widely used format but it can reduce the quality of your photo significantly. However, if you want to optimize an image for posting on Facebook or Instagram then this may be the best option for you since these platforms support JPEG more than any other format. In addition, there are plenty of apps that will automatically optimize photos for mobile sharing like Optimizilla for example.
PNG is a lossless format which means that there will be no quality loss when compressing them (as opposed to JPEG), however they are bigger in size so they are not always suitable if you need to post quickly or if you don't have much space available on your device or memory card/drive etc... But if space isn't an issue, then go ahead with PNG! They do look good too.
GIFs are good because they are small files which means less loading time and faster downloading speeds - especially useful when trying to speed up loading time on older computer systems like mine where everything takes ages! This is also one of their biggest drawbacks though: not all social media platforms support .gif files so some users won't be able to see them without installing additional software like GifBrewery which would convert .gif files into .mp4/.webm/.avi formats compatible with all major social media platforms including Facebook where animated images aren't allowed unless converted first using this tool (that way we could avoid having our posts rejected).
Image size and aspect ratio
As you try to optimize your images for sharing across different platforms, keep these things in mind:
Image size and aspect ratio. The size of the image you upload depends on what platform you're sharing it on. For example, Instagram allows photos up to 1,080 pixels wide and 1080 pixels tall; Twitter only allows 140 x 280 pixel photos from Twitter Moments; Facebook's newsfeed does not accept animated GIFs or videos uploaded directly (if you want them to appear there, you'll need to share links). In addition to thinking about the aspect ratio—how tall/short are they?—you should also think about how big will this image be when it appears on my website?
Tools for image optimization
One of the best tools for image optimization is ShortPixel. This tool has a free version that allows you to upload up to 1,000 images at once, which makes it perfect for optimizing all of your stock photos before uploading them to your website.
Another great tool is JPEGmini. You can use this tool with Photoshop or on its own without any other software necessary because JPEGmini includes a built-in editor that allows you to modify compression levels and change preset quality settings before exporting an image file in either JPEG or PNG formats.
Lastly, don’t forget about Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool! This handy tool will analyze how well optimized your web pages are and give suggestions on how they can be improved based on recommendations from other websites in similar industries as yours (e-commerce stores, technology blogs). If there are any errors detected by running this analysis there will also be suggestions given about what those issues might be so that they can be fixed immediately rather than later down the road when more people visit their site but things still look pixelated or blurry because their images weren't properly optimized beforehand.
Optimize image loading times
Images can be a big part of your page’s loading time, but there are some strategies you can use to make sure images load quickly and smoothly:
Asynchronously load your images. The problem with loading all images at once is that if even one of them is slow to load, then the whole page will be slow to load. Instead, you should try to load each image asynchronously so that everything else on the page doesn’t have to wait for an image before finishing its own loading process. This way when people are scrolling through content they won’t see it suddenly stop because an image hasn't finished loading yet—it'll just appear progressively over time instead! One helpful tool for this is called LazyLoadr. It allows you set up rules for which images need lazyloading and how much bandwidth they take up per second so that only large photos will trigger a delay in loading (and again, only if needed). This way smaller sized images like thumbnails don't cause any delays at all!
Use the right file format for each platform and device type: GIFs were created specifically for animation purposes but may not always produce great results when used as still photographs due to their low quality resolution; JPEGs produce better quality than GIFs but also take longer due to compression factors involved with saving files using this format; PNGs provide the best quality without sacrificing speed since there isn't any kind of compression being applied during saving; SVG files contain vector graphics rather than rasterized ones which allows scaling up while maintaining clarity making them great options when dealing with logos or other logos where clarity matters most over size considerations.
Optimized images on social media
Image size: As you might expect, the ideal image size for social media varies from platform to platform. For example, Facebook recommends using 1200px x 628px images for desktop users and 640px x 640px images for mobile users; Twitter prefers 1000px x 1000px.
File type: Most social media sites are compatible with JPG and PNG files; however, some platforms may also support other file formats (such as GIF).
Aspect ratio: The aspect ratio of an image is its proportional dimensions—that is, how wide it is in relation to how tall it is (for example, 16x9). Most online photo sharing services offer a range of aspect ratios to choose from when uploading photos—but some still use square-shaped profiles instead of rectangular ones! If you want your profile picture on Instagram or Twitter to be displayed vertically rather than horizontally (which looks better if there's text or logo above/below), make sure not only that you're uploading an image with this kind of proportion but also that you've cropped out any extraneous information around the edges so that there isn't any overlap between elements like logos/watermarks/text overlaid onto them before saving as well - otherwise they'll show up blurry when viewed fullscreen!
Conclusion
Having the right image is an essential part of social media. With so many different platforms, it can be hard to know which one is best for your audience and what specifications are required for each platform. We hope this article has helped you understand these differences, so that you can use them to your advantage when sharing on social media!
Contact us for more information on image optimisation.
