Use Image Optimization To Reduce Your Page's Load Time

Each year there are more and more Internet users who switch to broadband access, yet there are still many Internet users who still use dialup connections. This is an important point to remember when creating and designing your website's pages. This needs to be taken into consideration because dial-up users have limited bandwidth and this causes slower information throughput. Slower throughput cause a slower loading of your website's pages.

In general, the text on your website pages will load in a very short time - even when the surfer uses a dialup connection. However, large images will be slow to load when dial-up is used, and it's very important to attain a delicate balance between using enough images to attract your users but no so many that it unreasonably slows down the overall loading time of your site.

It is also wise to further consider optimizing each image on your site to ensure that it loads in the least amount of time possible. This can be attained by using image editing software to save your image in a format that uses a smaller amount of storage space yet does not sacrifice quality. The best graphic appearance with the least amount of storage space utilized is the JPEG (.jpg) format. Most professional web designers know this and that is why most of the better designed web sites on the Internet utilize this format when presenting photos and graphics on their pages.

If you own Photoshop or Fireworks, (2 different graphics massaging programs) you will find that when you save an image as a JPEG file, a dialog box will appear and let you choose the "quality" of the JPEG image. Usually a setting of 80% will provide an image with enough quality to meet your needs, yet utilizing a relatively small file size. If you do not have Photoshop, you may download many different free photo programs from the Internet. One program highly recommended is the GIMP program and you can download a copy of it here.

There are many different types of graphical files format. The more common ones are:

• GIF

• JPG

• PNG

• PSD

Each one has its own strengths and weaknesses. Just remember to use the file type that will get the job done while using the least amount of file space, and your site will load in the least amount of time possible. Ultimately, this will provide for a more pleasing experience for your web site visitor and may cause them to return to your site again and again!

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