How to Use Base64 encoding to Improve Your Images and Website Performance

Published on Aug. 22, 2023, 12:13 p.m.

Do you want to improve your images and website performance?

Web browsers set limits on the number of connections they could send to the server.Therefore , a very image-heavy website had to join a queue of requests.With Base64, this problem could be circumvented by using an already open HTTP connection.

HTTP/2 introduced multiplexing.Since then, web browsers have become incredibly efficient at transferring a vast number of files.Base64 encoding have been bypassed .

What is Base64 encoding?

Base64 encoding is a way to encode binary data.It mostly used to store or transfer images, audio files, and other media online.

Things to consider when encoding images with Base64

Base64 encoding is most commonly used for compression and transmission of data.

Base64 encoding is a process that can be used to encode multimedia files into a format that can be viewed by all web browsers.However, there are many cases where image Base64 encoding will not be the best option.So if someone suggests you use Base64 to improve performance, you should take this with a grain of salt.

If you do not encode the images properly, it will slow down your site.Due to how Base64 works, the images cannot be stored locally and will need to be fetch from a CDN.Sharing Base64 images is also harder because they are not accessible.

When to avoid Base64 encoding

Especially if you want to store data as a file on your computer’s hard drive or send it over a network, there are other options that require less disk space than Base64-encoded files.

When it comes to filing sizes, Base64 encoding is not the most efficient way to encode data.The process always results in a 20%-25% increase in file size at least.

Another reason that Base64 encoding may not be the best option is that there are better compression methods for storing data.

When to use Base64 encoding

Base64 is very versatile in technology, but you should try not to use it as part of your HTML or CSS files .

Base64 is only useful for very small pictures.When it comes to larger images, bytes will end up being much larger than images.