Attracting customers and maintaining site performance are two key things to watch. One of the ways to improve site speed is optimizing your images on your Shopify store.
Unoptimized images can create a wrong impression on visitors and rank you down on search engines.
Yet, it’s often overlooked or done poorly. Not only does it help to improve page speed, but it also improves website SEO and reduces load time.
Optimizing images for your Shopify store is an excellent idea since you want to attract as many customers as possible.
In this article, we share different ways to help you optimize images and common mistakes to avoid.
What is Shopify Image Optimization?
Image optimization is all about reducing the file size of an image without compromising quality.
Image optimization is crucial for enhancing website performance by reducing page load time.
Slow-loading websites can lead to a poor user experience, and users may leave the site before it loads.
When we talk about the Shopify store, image size and format matter much more than you might think, but images don’t come in just one format, making things even more complicated for merchants as they try to get everything right.
Here are some of the image file formats that work well on Shopify:
- JPEG images: The jpeg format is a popular format that supports various colors and is ideal for photographs.
- PNG images: A PNG format that preserves the quality of the image even after being compressed. It is excellent for graphics and images with transparent backgrounds.
- GIF images: A format that supports animation and is perfect for creating short, looping animations.
- WebP: A newer format that offers smaller file sizes without sacrificing image quality. It is excellent for improving website load times.
Using these image file formats on your Shopify store ensures your images look great and load quickly for your customers.
Best Image Sizes for Shopify Stores
The best image file size for your online store depends upon the Shopify theme you use.
Each theme has different design aspects that alter your image size. But here are some general guidelines that work best for most themes.
The product and collection images can be sized up to 4472 X 4472 px, or 20 megapixels. For square products, the size of 2048 X 2048 px usually looks best, more polished, and professional.
In addition, you do not need to go too small; the size 800 X 800 px won’t allow you to zoom up, so make sure your image is perfect.
Different themes can crop your images and affect your store’s looks & feels.
Therefore, ensure your themes’ image requirements are for the best results.
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Benefits of Optimizing Product Images on Shopify
Optimizing product images on Shopify can improve your website’s loading speed, enhance the overall user experience, and increase your website’s search engine rankings.
Additionally, visually appealing product images can increase customers’ likelihood of purchasing.
Here are some benefits of Optimizing Product Images on Shopify-
Improved Page Load Speed
Reducing the file size of the images without compromising their quality can help you improve load speeds.
Images require more space to store than text or code on your website store and often make up the bulk space of your web page.
Optimizing images helps a website load faster, and visitors are likelier to stay on your site.
Enhanced User Experience
Optimizing product images can improve the overall customer experience by providing clear and visually appealing representations of the product.
This can lead to increased engagement and higher conversion rates.
Better Search Engine Optimization
Optimizing product images or Image SEO can improve search engine ranking by reducing page load times and making the website more user-friendly.
Search engines favor websites that load quickly and provide a positive user experience.
In addition, adding alt text on your images can showcase it on Google image search results, thus improving SEO ranking.
Best Shopify Image Optimization Tips
1. Use Unique images
Using original images can make a significant difference when creating visually appealing content.
They help make your content stand out, tell a story, and uniquely convey your message.
In addition, using original images can also help boost brand recognition and awareness by showing the brand’s unique style and personality.
It can build credibility and trust among visitors by showing that you are investing in creating high-quality images.
Using Original images on your site can be SEO optimized by using relevant names, file formats, and alt text, and improve chances of ranking higher on search engines.
Further, they can be repurposed and used across multiple platforms, from social media to marketing campaigns.
So, next time you create content, consider using original images to enhance your message’s overall quality and impact.
2. Name your images correctly
Search engine bots crawl the names of files you upload on Shopify, just like the text on your pages.
Your product images might have photos like img_41.jpg, which the crawlers might not recognize.
Why? Because Google considers your image titles when deciding what keywords your page should rank for.
The best way is to name the image that describes it and separate it using a hyphen.
The way you name your product images should correlate with what your product is about and the product page.
The goal is to accurately put descriptive image names on the page and each image.
The image file names should incorporate the product name and the search terms people use to find the product.
Putting descriptive image names can help you rank higher on search result pages and Google images automatically.
3. Optimize Alt Tags
To improve your SEO game, ensure the alt text attribute is filled out for each image so crawlers can understand what the image is about.
Alt attributes are the text alternatives that can be shown when a browser can’t render the images correctly.
Alt tags provide alternative text for your images and are essential for accessibility.
They also help search engines understand what your images are about.
Make sure to use relevant and helpful keywords in your image alt attributes.
In addition to improving accessibility and search engine optimization, using alt tags also helps with user experience.
When an image cannot be displayed, the alt tag describes what the image is about, allowing users with visual impairments to understand the content of your website.
Here are some tips for creating effective alt tags:
- Keep it concise: Alt tags should be brief and to the point, describing the image in a few words.
- Be descriptive: Use descriptive language to convey what the image is about accurately.
- Use relevant keywords: Including relevant keywords in your alt tags can improve your search engine rankings.
- Avoid keyword stuffing: While including relevant keywords is essential, avoid overusing them in your alt tags, as they can be seen as spammy.
4. Choose the Right Image Format and Size
Choosing the right file format for your images is crucial to ensure they look their best on your website or other digital projects.
One crucial aspect to consider when choosing file format is the type of image you have.
For example, if you have a photograph with a lot of detail and color, a JPEG format may be the best option to preserve the quality while reducing file size.
On the other hand, a PNG format may be more suitable for a logo design or graphic with sharp lines and solid colors.
Taking the time to choose the best image format can make a big difference in the appearance of your image quality on the website.
Shopify recommends using JPEG for picture format, product images, and blog posts, while it recommends using PNG for decorative images such as logos, trims, and borders.
In addition, you can also add GIFs, but they are of very low-quality images.
They can be an option to add dynamic elements to your Shopify store, but overall, they limit the use.
Further, Shopify helps you to automatically serve .jpg and .png files in WebP format whenever the browser supports it.
Using the correct file format for your images ensures they look their best and are optimized for your online store.
In addition, if you have many images on your website, use lazy load images to improve page load time.
5. Use Image Compression Tools
Reducing the file size of your images can be extremely helpful, especially when you are working with limited storage space or need to upload them to a website or email.
Fortunately, there are several ways to compress your images without sacrificing quality.
When uploaded to your store, an image is typically saved in a high-quality format.
However, these file sizes might be larger than needed, increasing the load time and slowing your entire website.
There are two types of Compression: Lossless compression and Lossy compression.
- Lossless Compression: These are slight reductions in file sizes with no quality change.
- Lossy Compression: Lossy compression lowers an image’s resolution by discarding information considered less essential or undetectable to the human eye.
So, how do you reduce the image file size or compress images?
There are lots of tools available out there that can help you to optimize images automatically.
These apps optimize images without changing the image quality and file type, automatically compressing and uploading images on your specified Shopify page.
The best Shopify image compressor tool can help you compress images perfectly, improve the load speed of your website, and help you rank better.
6. Use sitemaps for image
A sitemap is a file that provides search engine crawlers with information about the pages on your website that you want to be indexed.
Including image URLs in your sitemap can help search engines find and index your images more efficiently.
Image sitemaps might look more technical, but they are crucial for your store if you use a lot of image pop-ups, carousels, or galleries on your site.
While these images can help you improve customers’ experience, without image sitemaps, search engine crawlers might miss them easily.
A good solution is to create a separate sitemap for your images that helps crawlers know what is on your website and ensure nothing is missed.
By using a sitemap to help search engines find your images, you can improve your image SEO and increase the visibility of your website in search results.
7. Use Responsive Images
One of the main challenges when designing for the web is ensuring that your content looks good and is accessible on all devices.
Responsive images are a key tool in achieving this goal. Regardless of what your store sells, some of the audience would visit using mobile devices.
Responsive images ensure they adjust to the size of the screen, which means they can be displayed correctly and load quickly, irrespective of the device.
With Google’s mobile-first approach, you want to ensure that customers get a seamless experience, and using responsive images is indispensable.
To ensure your image can adjust the screen size, use a modern Shopify theme to simplify your job.
These themes can automatically compress images and generate a block of HTML that instructs the browser to load specific image sizes based on the device your customer uses.
8. Consider Lazy Loading
Lazy loading is a great technique to improve website performance and user experience.
It only displays images to visitors when users need to display them; they won’t have to wait for all elements on the page to be loaded.
Lazy loading can significantly reduce the initial page load time, which is critical for retaining impatient visitors.
The images load as soon as the user scrolls the page.
It can also reduce the total amount of data that needs to be downloaded, especially for websites with many images or videos.
By deferring the loading of non-critical content, lazy loading can improve the perceived performance, making the website faster and more responsive.
You should also consider the impact of lazy loading on search engine optimization (SEO), as some search engines may be unable to discover or index lazy-loaded content.
Lacking loading is a powerful technique that can help improve website performance and user experience.
9. Use CDN
Image CDNs are among the best tools for optimizing images, which can help improve a website’s loading speed and performance.
A CDN for images specializes in optimizing, converting, and delivering images WorldWide.
A CDN distributes a load of images on multiple servers, reducing strains on your website servers and preventing them from becoming overloaded during peak traffic periods.
In addition, faster loading times can result in a better customer experience, and visitors don’t have to wait long for images to load.
Further, CDNs have servers located at multiple locations worldwide, which helps to improve the loading speed of your website in different geographic locations.
Overall, using a CDN to host your images can be a simple and effective way to improve your website’s performance.
10. Test your images
When discussing online stores, image is vital in grabbing customers’ attention and influencing them to purchase.
Like any other solution, it is crucial to test images on multiple factors and devices.
Here are some tips to ensure your images are optimized for web pages:
- Test your images on various screen sizes: Whether your audience is viewing your website on a desktop, tablet, or mobile device, it’s essential to make sure your images look good and are appropriately sized for each screen size.
- Check image file size: Large image files can slow down your website’s load time, negatively impacting the user experience and search engine optimization. Use the best image optimization tools to get advanced image compression and improve loading time.
- Use appropriate image formats: Different browsers support different image formats, so using the appropriate format for each image is essential. For example, JPEG is best for photographs, while PNG is best for graphics with transparent backgrounds.
By testing images, you can ensure your images look great, are optimized for the website, load quickly, and improve customer experience.
Common Mistakes to Avoid When Optimizing Shopify Images
- Not compressing images
- Not Using Descriptive File Names
- Uploading Images are too large or too Small
- Not Considering Mobile Optimization
- Poorly Optimized Alt Tags
- Ignoring Image Formats
- Lack of Image Metadata
- Not Consistent in Image Sizes
You spend lots of time and energy creating captivating pictures to ensure your website stands out.
By following these recommendations, you can improve conversions and loading speed and rank higher on search engine pages and fi and on Google image searches with relevant keywords.
It’s more than just showcasing images; it’s optimizing the images on each page to enhance customer experience.
By following tips such as compressing images, using the correct file types, and reducing image size, you can significantly enhance your website’s performance and user experience.
Always prioritize quality, relevance, and accessibility when choosing and optimizing images.
Shopify Image Optimizer tools can significantly help optimize your images and boost site speed and SEO ranking.
