Minification does things like rename variables to single characters, remove dead code, optimize code in a number of ways, inline constants, shorten if statement

Minification does things like rename variables to single characters, remove dead code, optimize code in a number of ways, inline constants, shorten if statements, unroll loops, hoist variables, rewrite comparisons, and more. It is compilation in just about every sense of the word (especially when combined with a compiler like babel or typescript) Yes, it's not obfuscation, but neither is webasm.