How to optimize, compress, convert images to WebP in WordPress with EWWW Image Optimizer plugin including JPEG, PNG, GIF, ICO and lazyload support, speed up and optimize WordPress. Switching to the WebP format for your images will improve the performance of your WP site and improve the visitor’s experience.
Compress, Optimize, and Convert: Mastering WebP Images in WordPress
WordPress supports the most popular image file formats, including JPG, PNG, GIF, and ICO, and the WebP image format was recently added to this list. Finally, WebP is supported in all major browsers (Opera, Chrome, Edge, Safari and Firefox) and so most websites can start using them today.
There are quite a few plugins to help you do this, but we have tested and found the most useful is EWWW Image Optimizer which includes both paid and free Pro versions. But free is enough.
Note before using the EWWW Image Optimizer plugin to compress or convert images to WebP WordPress, your hosting or VPS must have a lot of space. The plugin will convert, convert your images to webp format, as well as resize images to fit screens. So it will take up a bit more of your disk space.
Step 1. Install the plugin to convert JPG, PNG.. to webp images
Visit the download page to download the zip file, then log in to the admin management page, click Plugin->Add new->Upload Plugin to install. Or you can also search “ EWWW Image Optimizer ” and install it directly.
![Install the plugin to convert JPG, PNG.. to webp images](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-1-1024x541.jpg)
Continue to click Activate once the plugin has been installed and move on to the next step to configure image compress and convert images to WebP WordPress.
Step 2. Configure to create and use WebP images
Click Settings -> EWWW Image Optimizer. Here, there will be 2 modes: Easy Mode and Ludicrous Mode. If you are inexperienced, we recommend you experiment with Easy Mode first.
Easy Mode Configuration
![configuring EWWW Image Optimizer plugin](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-2-1024x543.jpg)
As you can see, there are quite a few functions and options that allow you to process images, such as convert images to WebP wordpress, deleting metadata, resize… please configure it like your screenshot.
![optimize compress convert images to webp wordpress 3](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-3-1024x543.jpg)
Configure Ludicrous Mode
This is a mode with more advanced customizations, you can enable automatic scheduling with a cronjob, remove images that you don’t want to change, or optimize custom folders.
![optimize compress convert images to webp wordpress 4](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-4-1024x504.jpg)
Use it to optimize and convert images to WebP for WordPress. However, we only care about the “JPG Quality Level” and “WebP Quality Level” settings in the Advanced tab. The default is 75-82, but it will still resize the image, so you should set the value to 100 for the best quality when converting to WebP.
Continue, tick the ” Resize Existing Images ” and ” Resize Other Images ” in the Resize tab and ignore the rest of the tabs.
![Convert images to webp for WordPress](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-5-1024x548.jpg)
Click “ Save Changes ” after completing the setup and move on to step 3 “Bulk Optimizer”.
Step 3. Optimize images and convert PNG, JPG to webp
To do this you can click “ Bulk Optimizer ” in the top right corner in Settings -> EWWW Image Optimizer, or Media->Bulk Optimize.
![optimize images and convert PNG, JPG to webp](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-6-1024x548.jpg)
Click “ Scan for unoptimized images ” to start scanning the library and perform optimization, if you do not want to optimize the images in webp format, then check the box “ Skip compression and only attempt WebP conversion. ” on the right.
![optimize compress convert images to webp wordpress 7](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-7-1024x548.jpg)
If you later do not want to use EWWW Image Optimizer to optimize images you can uninstall and delete the optimized images generated by the plugin by opening Tool->EWWW Image Optimizer.
![optimize compress convert images to webp wordpress 8](https://arriveddev.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/optimize-compress-convert-images-to-webp-wordpress-8-1024x551.jpg)
Very easy isn’t it, that’s the whole process of compressing and converting JPG, PNG images to webp format for WordPress with the EWWW Image Optimizer plugin. Also, if you have a lot of unused images, you can delete them using the Media Cleaner Pro plugin.
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