WordPress plugins for adaptive images
There are a few WordPress plugins that help to serve the correct image size to the device, called adaptive images.
Basically a small image downloads first – whether that is in size or resolution.
If the screen resolution is large then the plugin provides the bigger version. This speeds up the waiting time for the visitor.
This is a great solution if you want to use those big, full screen hero images but are concerned about download time.
There are two adaptive image plugins that I like:
What I would do is use these adaptive plugins, but don’t fully rely on them.
Never upload photos to your WordPress site straight from a camera. See my post ‘Why resize images for the web?‘.
Keep your media library clean and WordPress website working fast.
Resize the image first to, around 2000 pixels – this is enough for an extra-large screen size.
Now compress minimally to bring the kilobytes down.
Once you upload it to WordPress, the adaptive image plugin will do the rest.
It does pain me to upload such big images, but I understand people want to follow the trend.
