Do I have to keep images in the media library for them to appear on my blog?
-
I am running out of space and wanted to know if deleting images from media library would also delete them from published posts?
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
-
Yes, it will. When you post an image on your blog you’re actually only posting a link to that image. The image itself is hosted in your media library, so removing it from there will also remove it from all posts.
I had a quick look at your blog and downloaded an image at random. The file size of that image is 4Mb with a resolution of over 4000 pixels. You theme can at most display images that are 640 pixels wide, which will have a file size of no more than 150Kb. In other words, by uploading full-res images without optimising them first you have burned through your media storage in no time. Had you optimised first you probably wouldn’t have used up 10% of your storage by now.
You have three options as I see it:
Simplest but most expensive: buy a storage upgrade, though you’d better start optimising your images before uploading or you’re going to burn through that just as quickly.
Little less simple but at least free: start hosting your images elsewhere, such as Picasa Web Albums or Flickr, etc. Keep in mind on those you will also have limited storage, so start optimising. When you insert images into posts you’ll use the “Insert using URL” option.
Best (in my mind), but also bloody hard work (I know because I’ve been doing this with images in my earlier posts from when I did not yet know any better): One by one, download each image from your media library and resize to around 640 pixels (or resize the original on your hard drive. You can do this in any photo editing software, though doing it when exporting an image from Picasa is simplest for me), delete the image from your media library and upload the resized image in its place. Of course, if that image has been uploaded to multiple posts you’ll have to re-insert it in every one of those posts as the image will now have a different URL.
You will see that the image editor has an option to scale down uploaded images, but in my experience that doesn’t help. In fact, it increases media usage as the system still keeps the full size image in addition to the resized one. That’s why I’m going for download – delete – re-upload as explained here.
-
-
Do keep in mind that images that appear as Featured Images or are included in a Gallery must be uploaded to your site in order to work correctly. You can’t use the “Insert from URL” option with those.
Also, many themes’ Featured Image need to be much larger than 640 pixels wide in order to display.
-
@justjennifer
Good point, thanks.But even 1200 pixels is still much smaller than 4000 in terms of file size.
-
True! Even after nearly 8 years, I’m using about 5% of my storage.
There are utilities online that one can use to put images on a diet. My favorite is still JPEGmini. http://gammagirl.wordpress.com/2012/06/06/new-image-rotation-and-scrunching-reloaded/
-
- The topic ‘Do I have to keep images in the media library for them to appear on my blog?’ is closed to new replies.
WordPress.com Forums 