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The trouble is that images are a large fraction of the page size even for well optimised websites. Using smaller images via changing format often makes a signi

The trouble is that images are a large fraction of the page size even for well optimised websites. Using smaller images via changing format often makes a significant difference in the page load time. It's also relatively easy for new formats to be adopted - the html picture tag makes it really easy to serve the same image in multiple formats to allow for backward compatibility. And of course image decoders are easily distributed - JXL's encoder/decoder are open source. The combination of those two factors probably means that this will never be a settled area now. It's fairly easy for websites to adopt a new format and there are strong reasons to. Means, motive and opportunity. I reckon Chrome will cave in eventually. The pressure on browser performance is intense. Unless they want to see Safari faster in benchmarks of image heavy pages they will have to adopt it.

CharlesW 3y ago
> The trouble is that images are a large fraction of the page size even for well optimised websites. Using smaller images via changing format often makes a significant difference in the page load time. That's true, but even savvy people don't seem to care much about this. For example, (open) podcasts are still universally MP3-based even though it's been possible for many years to halve their size using modern, ubiquitous audio formats. > I reckon Chrome will cave in eventually. The pressure on browser performance is intense. Unless they want to see Safari faster in benchmarks of image heavy pages they will have to adopt it. What's curious about this to me is why Apple is single-handedly saving JPEG-XL from obscurity when AV1 is also a fine substitute for mainstream image compression use cases.
- eviks 3y ago
  Tangentially related, some clients don't handle variable encodings well, putting another limit on efficiency improvements indeed a pity progress is so slow even in these easier cases of widely available improvements
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- zilti 3y ago
  The podcast (and audio in general) thing annoys me way more than it should. FFS, just use Opus, it is supported on virtually all devices out there and is massively smaller
  - praisewhitey 3y ago
    last I checked the iPhone podcasts app doesn't play opus. Have things changed?
    - coconut08 3y ago
      it's not just the podcasts app. ios itself doesn't support opus. i've run into this problem with plenty of other apps in ios.
      - zilti 3y ago
        Well then fuck iOS
- Flimm 3y ago
  I didn't know that about podcasts and audio formats. What format would you recommend? It would need to be well-supported by podcast players.
  - gsich 3y ago
    Opus
  - jdiff 3y ago
    Opus is pretty widely supported (still some holes though, for example very few Adobe products support Opus), and it can sound better than MP3 at less than half the bitrate.
  - CharlesW 3y ago
    > What format would you recommend? It would need to be well-supported by podcast players. HE-AAC. Support for HE-AAC and HE-AAC v2 has been universal on modern media platforms and operating systems for well over a decade.¹ • All versions of Android support HE-AAC v2 playback² - Google also added encoders in Android 4.1 (2012) • iOS introduced support for HE-AAC v2 playback in iOS 4 (released 2010) • macOS introduced support for HE-AAC v2 playback with iTunes 9.2 (released 2010) • I'm not sure when Windows added support, but it was available in Windows 8 • All open source players support HE-AAC v2 playback via FAAD2 FWIW, I distributed a reasonably-popular podcast (1.2M downloads over its lifetime) using HE-AAC v2 several years ago, and never received a complaint, or found a player it didn't work on. ¹ I read the other comments recommending Opus before responding, and although Opus is very nice, it's not as efficient or as ubiquitous as HE-AAC. ² https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/media/media-formats https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/media/media-forma...
    - vetinari 3y ago
      FAAD2 is in non-free repositories; for open source, it presents a problem with distribution outside of freeworld. Neither Opus nor mp3 have this problem. So to maximize compatibility, mp3 is still the best choice, due to the attitude to Opus and other free codecs that Apple has.
- spiralpolitik 3y ago
  My guess is the fact that existing jpeg images can be transcoded to jpeg-xl losslessly is the driving feature. This gives an easy migration path for existing sites that don't have high resolution masters that can be re-encoded into AV1 or webp. Also think of 20+ years of jpg digital camera photos that can now be transcoded to save space. For Apple that is also a huge win.
- tambourine_man 3y ago
  MP3 is also good enough. Modern compressors are on par with Opus, AAC or whatever is in fashion now. The format is sane, patents have expired, it run everywhere. It's not worth the trouble.
  - zerocrates 3y ago
    Opus you'd get away with half the bitrate, or less, than MP3 for a podcast. Gets to be somewhat significant given the length of many podcasts, those 64kbps or so that you save add up over time. Though I agree, the "works everywhere" aspect is really the overriding factor: everyone can play it, all the services will accept it, etc. I think the only way you'd see it get used significantly is if a major service was transcoding to it, but I don't know that podcast bandwidth is a sufficient cost for anyone to bother.
    - CharlesW 3y ago
      HE-AAC is a bit better than Opus, plus has the benefit of MP3's "works everywhere" experience. I posted more detail elsewhere in the thread if you're interested.
      - quikee 3y ago
        xHE-AAC from 2016 (also known as USAC) yes. The older HE-AAC from 2003 and HE-AACv2 are not. Codecs have similar names, but they are different and released at different times.
        CharlesW 3y ago
        USAC doesn't meet the "ubiquitous" requirement for this use case. Regarding your claim that Opus is better than HE-AAC, here's a "Quality vs Bitrate" chart from opus-codec.org, the home of Opus: https://opus-codec.org/static/comparison/quality.svg https://opus-codec.org/static/comparison/quality.svg Note that AAC (presumably they mean "Main Profile" rather than AAC-LC) has effectively the same efficiency as Opus. HE-AAC and HE-AACv2 have a higher efficiency than both Opus and AAC, and works great at lower bitrates in comparison to AAC.
- worrycue 3y ago
  > What's curious about this to me is why Apple is single-handedly saving JPEG-XL from obscurity when AV1 is also a fine substitute for mainstream image compression use cases. Apple does whatever they want. If they think something is better, they will go ahead and use it, the rest of the market be damned.
formerly_proven 3y ago
> The trouble is that images are a large fraction of the page size even for well optimised websites. Using smaller images via changing format often makes a significant difference in the page load time. Pepperidge farm remembers Google heavily pushing for WebP for this reason. Look how much smaller it is! and Lighthouse giving demerits for every non-WebP image. Which, of course, is totally true, WebP images were almost always quite a bit smaller. They all looked like shit, too, of course.

CharlesW 3y ago

> The trouble is that images are a large fraction of the page size even for well optimised websites. Using smaller images via changing format often makes a significant difference in the page load time. That's true, but even savvy people don't seem to care much about this. For example, (open) podcasts are still universally MP3-based even though it's been possible for many years to halve their size using modern, ubiquitous audio formats. > I reckon Chrome will cave in eventually. The pressure on browser performance is intense. Unless they want to see Safari faster in benchmarks of image heavy pages they will have to adopt it. What's curious about this to me is why Apple is single-handedly saving JPEG-XL from obscurity when AV1 is also a fine substitute for mainstream image compression use cases.

eviks 3y ago
Tangentially related, some clients don't handle variable encodings well, putting another limit on efficiency improvements indeed a pity progress is so slow even in these easier cases of widely available improvements
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
zilti 3y ago
The podcast (and audio in general) thing annoys me way more than it should. FFS, just use Opus, it is supported on virtually all devices out there and is massively smaller
- praisewhitey 3y ago
  last I checked the iPhone podcasts app doesn't play opus. Have things changed?
  - coconut08 3y ago
    it's not just the podcasts app. ios itself doesn't support opus. i've run into this problem with plenty of other apps in ios.
    - zilti 3y ago
      Well then fuck iOS
Flimm 3y ago
I didn't know that about podcasts and audio formats. What format would you recommend? It would need to be well-supported by podcast players.
- gsich 3y ago
  Opus
- jdiff 3y ago
  Opus is pretty widely supported (still some holes though, for example very few Adobe products support Opus), and it can sound better than MP3 at less than half the bitrate.
- CharlesW 3y ago
  > What format would you recommend? It would need to be well-supported by podcast players. HE-AAC. Support for HE-AAC and HE-AAC v2 has been universal on modern media platforms and operating systems for well over a decade.¹ • All versions of Android support HE-AAC v2 playback² - Google also added encoders in Android 4.1 (2012) • iOS introduced support for HE-AAC v2 playback in iOS 4 (released 2010) • macOS introduced support for HE-AAC v2 playback with iTunes 9.2 (released 2010) • I'm not sure when Windows added support, but it was available in Windows 8 • All open source players support HE-AAC v2 playback via FAAD2 FWIW, I distributed a reasonably-popular podcast (1.2M downloads over its lifetime) using HE-AAC v2 several years ago, and never received a complaint, or found a player it didn't work on. ¹ I read the other comments recommending Opus before responding, and although Opus is very nice, it's not as efficient or as ubiquitous as HE-AAC. ² https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/media/media-formats https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/media/media-forma...
  - vetinari 3y ago
    FAAD2 is in non-free repositories; for open source, it presents a problem with distribution outside of freeworld. Neither Opus nor mp3 have this problem. So to maximize compatibility, mp3 is still the best choice, due to the attitude to Opus and other free codecs that Apple has.
spiralpolitik 3y ago
My guess is the fact that existing jpeg images can be transcoded to jpeg-xl losslessly is the driving feature. This gives an easy migration path for existing sites that don't have high resolution masters that can be re-encoded into AV1 or webp. Also think of 20+ years of jpg digital camera photos that can now be transcoded to save space. For Apple that is also a huge win.
tambourine_man 3y ago
MP3 is also good enough. Modern compressors are on par with Opus, AAC or whatever is in fashion now. The format is sane, patents have expired, it run everywhere. It's not worth the trouble.
- zerocrates 3y ago
  Opus you'd get away with half the bitrate, or less, than MP3 for a podcast. Gets to be somewhat significant given the length of many podcasts, those 64kbps or so that you save add up over time. Though I agree, the "works everywhere" aspect is really the overriding factor: everyone can play it, all the services will accept it, etc. I think the only way you'd see it get used significantly is if a major service was transcoding to it, but I don't know that podcast bandwidth is a sufficient cost for anyone to bother.
  - CharlesW 3y ago
    HE-AAC is a bit better than Opus, plus has the benefit of MP3's "works everywhere" experience. I posted more detail elsewhere in the thread if you're interested.
    - quikee 3y ago
      xHE-AAC from 2016 (also known as USAC) yes. The older HE-AAC from 2003 and HE-AACv2 are not. Codecs have similar names, but they are different and released at different times.
      - CharlesW 3y ago
        USAC doesn't meet the "ubiquitous" requirement for this use case. Regarding your claim that Opus is better than HE-AAC, here's a "Quality vs Bitrate" chart from opus-codec.org, the home of Opus: https://opus-codec.org/static/comparison/quality.svg https://opus-codec.org/static/comparison/quality.svg Note that AAC (presumably they mean "Main Profile" rather than AAC-LC) has effectively the same efficiency as Opus. HE-AAC and HE-AACv2 have a higher efficiency than both Opus and AAC, and works great at lower bitrates in comparison to AAC.
worrycue 3y ago
> What's curious about this to me is why Apple is single-handedly saving JPEG-XL from obscurity when AV1 is also a fine substitute for mainstream image compression use cases. Apple does whatever they want. If they think something is better, they will go ahead and use it, the rest of the market be damned.

formerly_proven 3y ago

> The trouble is that images are a large fraction of the page size even for well optimised websites. Using smaller images via changing format often makes a significant difference in the page load time. Pepperidge farm remembers Google heavily pushing for WebP for this reason. Look how much smaller it is! and Lighthouse giving demerits for every non-WebP image. Which, of course, is totally true, WebP images were almost always quite a bit smaller. They all looked like shit, too, of course.