PNG vs JPG vs WebP: Which Image Format Should You Use?
Article•By Team
The Big Three: A Quick Overview
Choosing the right image format is one of the easiest ways to speed up your website. But with so many acronyms, it gets confusing. Here is the breakdown.
1. JPG (JPEG)
- Best for: Photographs, complex gradients, and "real world" images.
- Pros: Small file size, universal compatibility.
- Cons: No transparency (backgrounds are always white), "lossy" compression can look blurry if overdone.
2. PNG
- Best for: Logos, screenshots, icons, and images with text.
- Pros: Supports Transparency, crisp edges, lossless quality.
- Cons: Files can get huge. A complex photo in PNG might be 5x larger than a JPG.
3. WebP (The Modern Standard)
- Best for: Everything on the web.
- Pros: Supports transparency (like PNG) and high compression (like JPG). Usually 30% smaller than both.
- Cons: Older browsers (Internet Explorer) don't support it, though this is rarely an issue in 2024.
The Verdict
For modern web development, WebP is the winner. It offers the best balance of quality and file size.
- Need to convert your old PNGs to WebP? Use our Converter Tool to save bandwidth instantly.