How to compress images in PHP?

You can test for quality loss by using PHP GD and see if it suits you. you can also do this while uploading the image:

function compressImage($source_path, $destination_path, $quality) {
    $info = getimagesize($source_path);

    if ($info['mime'] == 'image/jpeg') {
        $image = imagecreatefromjpeg($source_path);
    } elseif ($info['mime'] == 'image/png') {
        $image = imagecreatefrompng($source_path);
    }

    imagejpeg($image, $destination_path, $quality);

    return $destination_path;
}

Explaining the functions used:

• getimagesize() : returns the image information (type, size, dimensions, etc.), we use to achieve the MIME Type of the original image.
• imagecreatefromjpeg() : creates a new image from the original image.
• imagejpeg() : send an image to the browser or to a file, this is where the lighter image is created.

Finally the function returns the path of the lighter image.

Usage example: $img = compressImage("images/praia.jpg", "images/compressed/compressed_praia.jpg", 6);

There are several image processing libraries, some of which I know are:

• GD2
• Imagemagick

I'd advise using Imagemagick ( that's the reason ).

Some things you can do to make sweating images look smaller.

• Convert image to JPG
• Use quality between 80 and 90 for JPG
• Resize image to a maximum size. Ex .: 800px wide
• Delete EXIF Headers

Sources:

link

Example:

<?php
    $image = new Imagick();

    $image->thumbnailImage(800, 300);
    $image->readImage('image.jpg');
    $image->setImageFormat('jpeg');
    $image->setImageCompressionQuality(85);
    $image->stripImage();

    $image->writeImage('nova_imagem.jpg');

?>