How Do You Know the Size of an Image?

On your phone:

1. Open the photo and tap the small edit crayon icon.
2. Tap the three dots at the top right corner.
3. Choose Resize.

You’ll see options like:

• 20% (376 x 816)
• 40% (753 x 1632), etc.

What do these numbers mean?

• The first number is the width, and the second is the height in pixels.
• For blog feature images, something around 1200 pixels wide is usually good.
• If you’re given a list of options, go for the one closest to 1200 wide (not smaller).

If you’re not sure, the 40% option is usually fine for blog posts. It’s smaller in file size but still clear.

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I Use Lightroom

Most of our travel photos are taken by Nisha and Hubby Basker, who both shoot in RAW format. Because of this, I need to do a bit of editing before I can use them on the blog.

I use Lightroom to convert the images to JPG and usually choose the “Download Small” option. This keeps the image looking sharp while reducing the file size, which suits the blog format well.

I don’t use presets or alter the colours — the photos are naturally full of colour, just as I saw them at the time. I simply crop, straighten, and if a photo is too dark, I may increase the brightness slightly. My aim is always to keep them natural and authentic.

For general-use images — things I wouldn’t normally photograph myself, like laptops or tech items — I occasionally use stock photos from Pixabay.

I also purchased another editing programme called AfterShot (from Product Keys), although I haven’t used it extensively yet — Lightroom does the job for now.

But my feature images (the big photo at the top of each blog post) were still making my site load slowly. So now I make sure those are properly resized before uploading.

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What Format Should You Use?

If you can, save your images in WEBP format. It works just like JPG but loads faster. You can use tools like:

• Squoosh
• Convertio
• TinyPNG

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WordPress Media Settings

If you’re using WordPress, there’s a handy place where you can adjust default image sizes. Go to Settings > Media in your WordPress dashboard. You’ll see three size options:

• Thumbnail – 150 x 150 pixels (good for small previews or galleries)
• Medium – 300 x 300 pixels (nice for smaller blog content images)
• Large – 1200 x 1024 pixels (great for full-width content or feature images)

These settings help WordPress automatically resize your images when you upload them. I recommend keeping the Large size width at 1200 pixels, which works well for feature images without being too heavy. Once these are set, WordPress will take care of resizing for you when you upload a big photo — very handy!

When you insert a photo into a post, WordPress lets you pick the size — you’ll see options like Thumbnail, Medium, Large, or Full Size. Here’s what they’re good for:

• Thumbnail – good for small preview images, like in a grid layout or recent posts.
• Medium – great for blog content where the image isn’t the main focus.
• Large – ideal for images you want to stretch across the post width.
• Full Size – only use this if your image is already resized appropriately (e.g. 1200 pixels wide), otherwise it might slow things down.

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How to Find and Fix Oversized Images

Use the Media Library
Go to Media > Library in your dashboard.

Switch to List View (small icon at top left next to “Media Library” title).

You’ll see the file size in KB or MB — large files (like 1MB or more) are probably being used at full size.

If your plan does not allow this you can click each image and check its dimensions (e.g. 4032 x 3024). If it’s still the original large size and you inserted it full size, that’s a good one to resize.

How Speed Tests Can Help Identify Large Images
If your blog is loading slowly, try running the free WordPress.com Speed Test. It will highlight anything that might be slowing your site down — including images that are too large or not properly resized. Often, your featured images or older uploads are the culprits. The report shows you which ones need attention so you can resize or re-upload them in a smaller format. It’s an easy way to spot and fix heavy images that could be affecting your page speed.

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Final Tips

• Always rename your image before uploading. Something like janet-india-temple.webp is better than IMG_3023.jpg.
• Keep image sizes around 100 to 200 KB if possible.
• If you’re on WordPress.com, they handle some of the compression for you, but it still helps to start with a tidy image.

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Why Bother?

Yes, it takes a few minutes to resize and rename your images, but your blog will load faster, and readers will stick around longer. It’s one of those little jobs that makes a big difference over time.

Hope this helps someone out there who’s been wondering the same thing. —♡ Janet