Qala ImgProxy is our solution for blazing-fast images that come with all Synotio 150£ hosting tiers and up. We will from May 2022 be including this in every new build we do for clients, and we will be able to backport older builds on demand. This is an amazing improvement for all of our clients.
On average 30% improved page speed
Why is Qala ImgProxy such a big deal? Because speed matters. It matters for end-users, and as such also for your google rankings. By improving the images on a website Qala ImgProxy makes the website on average 30% faster.
How does it work?
The first thing Qala ImgProxy does is that it serves a mobile-first image. This is a sized down version of all the images loaded at a low quality intended for handheld devices. Oftentimes we have a huge splash screen when you first enter the website. Imgproxy takes that image, resizes it and makes a tiny compressed version of it before serving it. That means that instead of something like 950KB we get 50KB.
After the page has loaded and the user can interact with the website, Qala ImgProxy then automatically loads a high-quality image in the low-quality images place – after checking if that is possible to do in the browser. Qala ImgProxy supports WEBP as well as AVIF, the latest and most performant image quality format known to man. Only problem is that it doesn’t work on older devices, so WEBP is what we usually recommend.
Thanks to its deep integration with WordPress, Qala ImgProxy doesn’t only give you a better format – it actually checks the screen resolution of the visitor and serves an image that is resized to fit that particular screen, based on the image container being of a certain size. That way if a user is on a large desktop computer they get served a larger high-quality image, while on a mobile device they get served a much smaller image. This has a huge impact on speed and performance for the end-user since a lot less image data is being served.
This is useful for both the busy entrepreneur building a startup that needs to do things fast, or the large organization with many editors where quality control can be an issue. Qala ImgProxy handles the problem automatically with a close to perfect result every time.
When does it not work?
Qala ImgProxy is designed to work Primarily with our flavor of WordPress & WooCommerce, Qala. However, this component will work with other themes. However; If the theme uses custom methods of image retrieval (such as Divi, Astra, etc does) only some of the functionality will work.
Interested in how we can improve your websites speed? Don’t be a stranger. Contact us.