You keep encountering WebP files — images that Chrome saves as .webp instead of .jpg, files that your image editor refuses to open, images that your phone camera app cannot send. All of this traces back to a single decision Google made in 2010 to build a better image format for the web.
Understanding why WebP exists helps explain both why it is everywhere now and why compatibility problems persist.
The Origin of WebP
In 2009, Google acquired On2 Technologies, a video codec company, for $106 million. On2's most valuable asset was the VP8 video codec — a sophisticated algorithm for compressing video with high quality at small file sizes.
Google's engineers noticed that the same mathematical techniques used to compress video frames could be applied to still images. A single video frame is essentially a still image, and VP8 was already excellent at compressing those. They adapted VP8's intra-frame compression technology into a still-image format and released it as WebP in September 2010.
The Technical Advantages of WebP
WebP outperforms JPG and PNG for different reasons depending on the use case:
Against JPG (lossy photography)
- 25-35% smaller files at equivalent visual quality — tested by Google across a large corpus of web images
- Better high-frequency detail preservation — WebP's block size and prediction modes handle edges and fine textures with fewer artifacts than JPEG's 8×8 DCT blocks
- Supports transparency — JPEG has no alpha channel; WebP supports full 8-bit alpha, making it useful for situations where PNG was previously the only option
Against PNG (lossless graphics)
- 26% smaller lossless files — WebP's lossless compression is more efficient than PNG's DEFLATE algorithm
- WebP lossless with alpha is 22% smaller than equivalent PNG with alpha
Animation
- Animated WebP replaces GIF with dramatically smaller files and full color support (vs GIF's 256-color limit)
- Much smaller than animated PNG (APNG) as well
Why Google Cares About Image File Sizes
At Google's scale, a 30% reduction in image file sizes is an enormous operational win:
| Service | Images per day (approximate) | Impact of 30% WebP savings |
|---|---|---|
| Google Search | Billions of thumbnails and preview images | Petabytes of bandwidth saved monthly |
| YouTube | Hundreds of billions of video thumbnails | Significant CDN cost reduction |
| Google Images | Trillions of image requests annually | Faster results pages globally |
| Google Shopping | Billions of product photos | Faster page loads, better conversion rates |
For the average website owner, the benefit is also real: smaller images load faster, which improves user experience, reduces bounce rates, and — since Google introduced Core Web Vitals as a ranking factor — can directly affect search rankings through better LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) scores.
How WebP Became the Default for Web Images
The adoption timeline explains why WebP files started appearing everywhere around 2018-2020, even though WebP was introduced in 2010:
- 2010: WebP launched. Only Chrome supported it initially.
- 2011: Chrome and Opera added WebP support.
- 2014: Chrome started using WebP for all Google Images results.
- 2019: Firefox 65 added WebP support — the last major desktop browser holdout.
- 2020: Safari 14 added WebP support — completing browser coverage.
- 2020-present: CDNs and image optimization services (Cloudflare, Cloudinary, Imgix) began automatically serving WebP to all browsers.
The 2019-2020 period was the tipping point. Once every major browser supported WebP, web developers could confidently serve WebP to all users without fallback complexity, and CDNs automated the conversion. That is when WebP became the default for most major websites.
Why Some Apps Still Cannot Open WebP
New image formats face a chicken-and-egg adoption problem: application developers need to write code to support new formats, but they do not prioritize this until the format is widely used. By the time WebP became widespread, many applications had already shipped versions that lacked WebP support.
Specific reasons different applications lack WebP support:
- Legacy software no longer in development: The classic Windows Photo Viewer (Windows 7 era) is effectively frozen. It will never support WebP.
- Hardware-based codecs: Some embedded devices (older printers, scanners, digital cameras) use hardware-baked image codecs that cannot be updated via software.
- Professional software update cycles: Photoshop before CC 2022, Lightroom Classic, After Effects — Adobe prioritizes other features and took until 2022 to add native WebP support.
- Print and production workflows: Print shops, publishing systems, and legal document management systems built before 2020 have no WebP support and update slowly.
- Email clients: Outlook desktop, corporate email systems, and older mobile email apps render WebP inconsistently because they embed a browser engine for HTML rendering, and older embedded engines may not support WebP.
What Comes After WebP?
AVIF (AV1 Image File Format), released in 2019, is the next-generation format. It improves on WebP:
- 50% smaller files than JPG at equivalent quality (vs WebP's 35%)
- Better performance on low-contrast images like skin tones
- Wider HDR and wide color gamut support
- More efficient lossless compression
AVIF browser support reached full coverage in 2023 (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Safari). Its adoption is following a similar trajectory to WebP, and some major CDNs already serve AVIF to supporting browsers. However, AVIF encoding is computationally expensive compared to WebP, slowing its rollout on dynamic image serving pipelines.
For the foreseeable future, WebP remains the dominant next-gen web image format — and the format you are most likely to encounter when saving images from websites.
Convert WebP to JPG or PNG — Any App, Any Platform
Right-click any WebP image and save as JPG. Works on every website.
Install WebP to JPG Converter — FreeRelated Guides
- WebP Not Supported? How to Fix It for Any App
- Why Can't I Save Images as JPG Anymore?
- WebP Browser Support in 2026
- WebP Image Quality Comparison
Frequently Asked Questions
Why did Google create WebP?
Google created WebP in 2010 to reduce web image file sizes, making pages load faster. It was derived from VP8 video codec technology acquired with On2 Technologies. At Google's scale, a 25-35% reduction in image sizes translates to billions in bandwidth savings and measurably faster services.
Why do some apps still not support WebP?
Supporting new image formats requires writing codec code. Applications built before WebP became widespread lack this code. Legacy apps no longer in development (old Windows Photo Viewer, older Photoshop) will never add it. Converting to JPG or PNG is the universal solution.
How much smaller are WebP files compared to JPG?
WebP lossy compression is typically 25-35% more efficient than JPEG at equivalent visual quality. WebP lossless is about 26% more efficient than PNG. For transparency images, WebP lossless with alpha is 22% smaller than equivalent PNG.
Do all websites use WebP now?
Most major websites (Google, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Amazon, Wikipedia) serve WebP to supporting browsers. Smaller sites without modern image optimization pipelines may still serve only JPG and PNG.
Will WebP replace JPG completely?
Not fully, and not soon. AVIF may eventually supersede WebP. But JPG's 30-year installed base across cameras, printers, professional workflows, and legacy systems means it will remain in use for decades alongside newer formats.
More Free Chrome Tools by Peak Productivity
