Lazyloading of images is a web optimisation technique that defers the loading of images until they are needed, i.e., when they appear in the user’s viewport.
When an image is lazyloaded, it doesn’t load until the user scrolls to the spot on the screen where it would be viewable. This can reduce bandwidth usage and speed up page loading, especially for pages with lots of graphics.
In other words, instead of loading all images on a webpage simultaneously, lazyloading ensures that images are loaded only when they become visible within the user’s viewport. By implementing lazyloading, websites are able to deliver a faster and more efficient user experience.
How does image lazyloading work?
Lazyloading is a JavaScript-based feature which loads images slowly while scrolling a webpage. It helps to reduce the unnecessary load on the page and reduces the time required to load the page. So, when you scroll down your webpage, it loads images slowly. So, when the user clicks on the image, it triggers an event and loads the image faster.
Why should you care about lazy loading?
Lazy loading saves your bandwidth, which means you will not be going to a server that is too busy to handle any request and your site will load much faster. In the same way, lazy loading saves you money because the server will not use more resources to load the images.
Besides all of the above, lazy loading also makes the images to appear faster on your site, which is beneficial for your users because images play an important role in SEO.
Why is lazyloading important for SEO?
Boosting Page Loading Speeds
One of the primary advantages of image lazyloading is its ability to significantly improve page loading speeds. When a user accesses a webpage, the most critical factor that determines their experience is how fast the page loads. This is where lazyloading comes to the rescue.
By lazily loading images, your website conserves valuable bandwidth and resources, allowing the page to load quicker. With reduced loading times, users are less likely to get impatient and abandon your website, ultimately leading to lower bounce rates and increased customer satisfaction.
Mobile Device Optimization
The rise of mobile devices as the preferred medium for accessing the internet cannot be ignored. In fact, Google’s mobile-first indexing emphasizes the importance of providing a seamless mobile experience. Image lazyloading plays a crucial role in optimizing your website for mobile devices.
With mobile-friendly design being a priority, lazyloading provides a significant advantage by minimizing the required bandwidth for loading images. This is particularly beneficial for users who have limited data plans and helps prevent them from quickly depleting their allocated data. By offering a mobile-optimized experience, you improve the chances of engaging and retaining mobile users while positively impacting your SEO efforts.
Increased Crawlability and Indexability
Another significant SEO benefit of image lazyloading is the improved crawlability and indexability of your webpages. Search engine crawlers have an easier time navigating through pages that have smaller sizes and quicker loading times.
Leveraging lazyloading reduces the overall size of your webpages by deferring the loading of non-visible images. This reduction in page size allows search engine bots to quickly crawl and index your content, resulting in improved visibility on the SERPs. By optimizing your website for efficient crawling, you enhance its overall SEO performance.
Optimization for Image Search Results
Image search is an essential component of modern internet usage. Many users directly access search engines to find images related to specific topics. It’s crucial to optimize your image content for better visibility in image search results, and image lazyloading can help you achieve that.
With lazyloading, key image-specific SEO factors such as alt texts, captions, and titles are preserved. These elements play a significant role in optimizing your images for search engines. By ensuring that these important attributes are fully visible to search engine crawlers, you enhance your chances of ranking higher in image search results, ultimately driving more targeted traffic to your website.
Why is it not good for SEO?
The first thing is that your page will take longer and load more slowly since the images will take longer to load. However, since it takes time for the photos to load in the first place, even if they do so later, it is not a significant consequence.
Lazy loading is detrimental to SEO for a second reason—it lowers the picture quality of your page, which will have an impact on SEO. Therefore, if the photographs are of great quality and they appear decent, your page’s chances of ranking well will increase. However, your page will look far worse than one with high-quality photographs if the images do not look nice.
Conclusion
As you strive to optimize your website for better search engine rankings, image lazyloading emerges as an indispensable technique. By seamlessly improving the user experience, reducing bounce rates, and enhancing page loading speeds, lazyloading contributes significantly to the overall SEO performance of your website. Additionally, with improved crawlability, indexability, and optimization for image search results, the benefits are numerable.
