Journey to JPEG XL: open-source experiments shaped the future of image coding
46 points
5 hours ago
| 9 comments
| opensource.googleblog.com
| HN
Mindless2112
3 hours ago
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> In this Gemini-reconstructed scene, ...

I'm generally pretty pro-AI, but I find this icky. Of course, I wouldn't have noticed except the whiteboard drawing seemed not quite right, so I'll probably be fooled in the future.

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zerobees
3 hours ago
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Based on what I've heard, Google is monitoring per-org usage and strongly / incessantly encouraging teams to experiment with the technology, so a lot of tokens get spent on pointless stuff like that. The preceding diagram, which is needlessly busy and blurry, appears to be AI-generated too.
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markdog12
3 hours ago
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Came here to say the same thing. Why add this fake image?
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Gigachad
2 hours ago
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Huge fan of JXL, but this article feels pretty AI sloppy. Not much said here, coming from the google blog I was hoping for some news about how they are pushing the format forward by introducing decoders in to Android and enabling on Chrome.

Android is the only mainstream OS that does not support JPEG XL right now.

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UnfitFootprint
1 hour ago
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Not to mention those IMAGES. Slop diagrams hurt
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yboris
3 hours ago
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Weird they don't name Jon Sneyers - a person pivotal in creation of JPEG XL

Here's a blog post by him: https://cloudinary.com/blog/2026-the-year-of-jpeg-xl

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rowbin
5 hours ago
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That's rich coming from the company that tried to kill it. The audacity...
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magicalist
3 hours ago
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> That's rich coming from the company that tried to kill it

This post is written by three of the authors of the JPEG XL spec, implementors of the reference and rust implementations of libjxl, and...longtime google employees.

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orbital-decay
3 hours ago
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From what I can tell, it's written by Gemini
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rowbin
5 hours ago
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> Safari (2023) led among major browsers, while Firefox and Chrome currently maintain experimental support.
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spartanatreyu
2 hours ago
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Yeah, but they left out that Chrome removed their own support for JPEG XL saying no one in the industry was in favour of it despite everyone seeing it was the future screaming for it and building support for it into their own products.

Chrome's blink was the only major browser engine not supporting it and that prevented it from becoming a web standard and they refused to acknowledge they were wrong.

Chrome only backtracked once jpeg-xl was subsumed into the PDF standard because if Chrome did not support jpeg-xl, they would by extension also not be supporting pdf.

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Gigachad
2 hours ago
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jpeg xl is also now used for the latest version of the DNG raw image format, and the iphone now encodes raw images as jpeg xl in DNG. It's so clearly the future for photography that Google is holding back. Apple surprisingly has been the first with full support everywhere in their OSs and in Safari.
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Caspy7
1 hour ago
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Safari is currently lacking animation and progressive decoding - still ahead of everyone else currently.

Looks like by the end of the year we can expect Chrome and Firefox support.

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Gigachad
2 hours ago
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Maintain in a sense. Google introduced it in Chrome as an experimental flag, then removed it with no real explanation, and only just brought it back.
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201984
51 minutes ago
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Mostly off topic, but why is the spec for JPEG and JPEG XL paywalled? I wouldn't call them open standards if they're not available free-of-charge to the public.
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Gigachad
36 minutes ago
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It's an open standard because the concepts and reference implementation are free and open source even if the PDF is paywalled. Realistically you could just pirate the PDF and write a jpeg xl encoder/decoder and your code wouldn't be infringing on any patents.
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lousken
3 hours ago
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Out of experimental when?
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Gigachad
2 hours ago
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Probably got some time to go. The new rust decoder likely needs more time to be proven reliable and safe, and Firefox doesn't even get the flag to turn it on until the next release 152.
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bnolsen
1 hour ago
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I personally think something like the qok format is a better way to go. Make something that performs well and is dirt simple to implement.
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LoganDark
1 hour ago
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I'm behind -- did Chrome un-remove JXL support? Google is suddenly behind it again? Why/how did they change their minds?
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Caspy7
1 hour ago
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Yes. They're adding it back to Chrome.

This last January at FOSDEM there was a panel with representatives from different browser companies. During the panel Kadir Topal, a web platform product manager at Google, indicated that because of the interest they saw in JPEG XL through the Interop Project that they changed their course on supporting it.

https://github.com/web-platform-tests/interop

The video of the panel can be found at https://fosdem.org/2026/schedule/event/7E7387-browser_in_202... . He starts speaking on the issue at about 13:00

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Gigachad
1 hour ago
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They added it back as an experimental flag again. Likely the new rust based decoder and adoption in to other platforms and standards changed their decision.
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neuroelectron
3 hours ago
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AI slop article
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