Looking for a Squoosh alternative?
Squoosh got the important idea right: do the work in the browser, never upload the file. imglean keeps that idea and carries it further.
Try imglean — free →No upload, no account, no file limit.
First, what Squoosh got right
It is worth being clear about this rather than positioning against it. Squoosh demonstrated that image compression does not need a server at all. By running codecs in the browser through WebAssembly, it made a genuinely private workflow possible — and it did this years before it became a common selling point.
If you are looking for an alternative, the reason is almost certainly not that the idea was wrong. It is that the project stopped moving.
Why people look for something else
Squoosh was built by Google as a demonstration of what the web platform could do. Demonstrations have a lifecycle: once the point is made, the project is archived rather than maintained. The site has kept working, but it is not receiving new features or new codec work.
That is fine for a one-off experiment. It is less fine when the tool has quietly become part of your workflow, and you would rather not depend on something nobody is actively working on.
What imglean does differently
It handles HEIC. iPhones save photos in HEIC, and a lot of the web still refuses to accept it. Being able to drop those files straight into the tool removes an entire extra step from the workflow — no exporting from Photos, no separate converter.
It does batch properly. You can add as many images as you want and leave it running. There is no file count limit, because the work happens on your machine and there is nothing for us to meter.
It offers both ends of the dial. Presets if you just want the file smaller and do not want to think about it, and a professional panel if you want to choose the codec, quality, and target dimensions yourself.
It states its privacy guarantee in a checkable form. The tool page
sends a connect-src 'self' policy, which instructs your
browser to block outbound requests to other domains. That is a guarantee
the browser enforces, not a promise in marketing copy.
Still the same core idea
To be explicit about what has not changed: your images are processed locally and are never uploaded. That was the point of Squoosh, it is the point here, and it is the reason this tool can offer unlimited use without a paywall on the things that made the original worth using.
Verify the claim yourself
- Open the tool in Chrome or Firefox.
- Press F12 and open the Network tab.
- Compress a few images.
- Confirm that no request carries your image data.
The page also sends a header that makes uploading impossible even by accident:
Content-Security-Policy: connect-src 'self'Questions
Is Squoosh discontinued?
It was built as a Google demonstration and has been archived rather than actively developed. The site has continued to work, but it is not receiving feature work.
Does imglean upload my images?
No. Compression runs in the browser via WebAssembly, same principle as Squoosh. The tool page's CSP header additionally blocks outbound requests to other domains.
What does imglean add?
HEIC decoding for iPhone photos, batch processing without a file count limit, and a professional panel alongside simple presets.
Should I switch if Squoosh works for me?
Not urgently. The practical reasons to switch are working with HEIC files, needing to process many images at once, or not wanting to depend on an archived project.
Try it and compare
Same idea, further along. Nothing to install.
Open imglean →