[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #56263: Proposed WebP Generation in Core should be opt-in, not opt-out

[WordPress Trac]

#56263: Proposed WebP Generation in Core should be opt-in, not opt-out
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 Reporter:  eatingrules  |       Owner:  (none)
     Type:  enhancement  |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal       |   Milestone:  Awaiting Review
Component:  Media        |     Version:
 Severity:  normal       |  Resolution:
 Keywords:               |     Focuses:  performance
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Comment (by jb510):

 TY Andrew for opening this ticket.

 Echoing what I've said elsewhere. I too support core natively supporting
 new image formats like WebP and hopefully soon AVIF. Format support like
 this is definitely core territory.

 My two concerns are how this impacts large existing sites (this ticket),
 and the delay it'll cause for authors "waiting for processing" when images
 are uploaded (the need for non-blocking background/shiny media uploads).

 My concern with large sites is the likelihood that a user will naively or
 unintentionally trigger an operation that "regenerates thumbnails" and in
 doing so severely impact sites. Out of disk space is not a fun situation
 to unexpectedly encounter, nor is doubling a remote backup from 100GB to
 200GB.

 This isn't an issue on average sites, but WordPress' reach means we can't
 just think about "average sites". Repeatedly WP has taken the approach
 that it's not looking at 80/20%, but more like 99/1%.

 Cases where this could easily happen:
  - WooCommerce regularly prompts to regenerate thumbnails - 5m installs
  - Regenerate Thumbnails (by Alex Mills) - installed on 1m sites.
  - Dozens of other plugins that generate retina images, optimize images,
 cache plugins, etc.

 The sane way to introduce this is to make it on by default only on
 new/fresh WP installs but make it opt-in on existing sites.  Heck even put
 a prompt to turn it on on the splash screen. It just takes a single toggle
 on settings/media.  It's not a complicated setting for users.

 If not that, then a less attractive approach would be to make it opt-in
 for a least a few versions of WP until it's stable and well supported
 enough in the theme and plugin ecosystem to be deemed safe to enable by
 default. This approach has been taken before.

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Ticket URL: <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/56263#comment:1>
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