How to Serve NextGen WebP Format Images in a Blogger Blog

In the world of web development, ensuring that your website meets the latest performance standards is crucial. Google's Core Web Vitals update has brought a heightened focus on user experience and page load speed. One key recommendation from Google's PageSpeed Insights tool is to serve NextGen image formats, such as WebP. While platforms like WordPress offer plugins to handle these optimizations, Blogger requires a more manual approach. This guide will walk you through how to serve WebP images on your Blogger blog, and address common challenges and solutions.

Understanding WebP Format

WebP is a modern image format developed by Google that provides superior compression methods compared to traditional formats like JPEG and PNG. By serving images in WebP format, you can significantly reduce the size of your images without compromising quality, leading to faster page load times and better performance scores.

How Blogger Handles Images

Blogger, a popular blogging platform by Google, automatically processes uploaded images, converting them into WebP format. This means that even if you upload images in JPEG, PNG, or GIF formats, Blogger’s image server can convert and serve these images in WebP format. However, understanding how to request these optimized images manually can further enhance your blog's performance.

Step-by-Step Guide to Serving WebP Images on Blogger

1. Uploading Images to Blogger

To begin with, upload your images as usual through the Blogger dashboard:

Go to your Blogger dashboard.

Navigate to the post or page where you want to insert the image.

Click on the "Insert Image" icon in the post editor.

Choose the image file (JPG, JPEG, PNG) from your computer and upload it.

2. Switching to HTML Mode

Once your image is uploaded, you need to switch to HTML mode to adjust the image URL:

In the post editor, click on the "HTML" tab to switch to HTML mode.

Locate the <img> tag for the uploaded image in the HTML code.

3. Modifying the Image URL

Blogger’s image server supports various image sizes and formats. To request the WebP version of your image, you need to modify the image URL by adding the -rw suffix:

Find the URL of the image in the <img> tag. It will look something like this:

html

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<img src="https://example.blogspot.com/path/to/image.jpg" alt="Description">

Modify the URL by adding -rw after the size parameter. For example:

html

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<img src="https://example.blogspot.com/path/to/image-s640.jpg" alt="Description">

Change it to:

html

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<img src="https://example.blogspot.com/path/to/image-s640-rw.jpg" alt="Description">

Here, s640 denotes the image size, and -rw requests the WebP format.

4. Adjusting Image Sizes

To serve different image sizes, adjust the size parameter accordingly:

For small images: s320 becomes s320-rw

For medium images: s640 becomes s640-rw

For large images: s1024 becomes s1024-rw

Example for a small image:

html

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<img src="https://example.blogspot.com/path/to/image-s320-rw.jpg" alt="Description">

5. Verifying WebP Image Delivery

To confirm that your image is being served in WebP format:

Save your changes and publish your post.

Open the published post in your browser.

Right-click on the image and select "Open image in new tab" or "Inspect" to view the image URL.

Check the URL to ensure it ends with -rw, indicating that the WebP format is being used.

Troubleshooting and Theme Compatibility

1. Theme Issues with WebP

Some Blogger themes may not fully support WebP images. If you encounter issues such as broken images or layout problems:

Access the Blogger theme editor.

Locate the main theme function file, which is typically a long JavaScript file near the </body> tag.

Update the code to replace image size parameters with the -rw suffix. For example:

javascript

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replace('/s72-c','/s680')

Change it to:

javascript

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replace('/s72-c','/s680-rw').replace('/s72-rc','/s680-rw')

Make sure to apply this change to all similar size parameters in the file.

2. Using WebP-Compatible Themes

If modifying your theme’s code is too complex, consider switching to a WebP-compatible Blogger theme. These themes are designed to handle WebP images seamlessly. You can find themes optimized for WebP image delivery or consult a professional to customize your existing theme.

Final Thoughts

Serving NextGen WebP images on Blogger can greatly improve your blog’s performance and adhere to Google's Core Web Vitals standards. By following the steps outlined above, you can manually request WebP images and ensure your blog benefits from faster load times and enhanced user experience.

Feel free to experiment with different image sizes and monitor your blog’s performance using tools like Google PageSpeed Insights. If you have any questions or run into issues, don’t hesitate to leave a comment or seek further assistance.

Happy blogging!