Mini SVG `data:` URI ==================== This tool converts SVGs into the most compact, compressible `data:` URI that SVG-supporting browsers tolerate. The results look like this (169 bytes): ```url data:image/svg+xml,%3csvg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' viewBox='0 0 50 50' %3e%3cpath d='M22 38V51L32 32l19-19v12C44 26 43 10 38 0 52 15 49 39 22 38z'/%3e %3c/svg%3e ``` Compare to the Base64 version (210 bytes): ```url data:image/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciIH ZpZXdCb3g9IjAgMCA1MCA1MCI+PHBhdGggZD0iTTIyIDM4VjUxTDMyIDMybDE5LTE5djEyQzQ0IDI2ID QzIDEwIDM4IDAgNTIgMTUgNDkgMzkgMjIgMzh6Ii8+PC9zdmc+ ``` Or the URL-encoded version other tools produce (256 bytes): ```url data:image/svg+xml;charset=US-ASCII,%3Csvg%20xmlns%3D%22http%3A%2F%2Fwww.w3.org% 2F2000%2Fsvg%22%20viewBox%3D%220%200%2050%2050%22%3E%3Cpath%20d%3D%22M22%2038V51 L32%2032l19-19v12C44%2026%2043%2010%2038%200%2052%2015%2049%2039%2022%2038z%22%2 F%3E%3C%2Fsvg%3E ``` For a more realistic example, I inlined the icons from the [Open Iconic](https://useiconic.com/open) project into CSS files with the 3 above methods: | Compression | Base64 | Basic %-encoding | `mini-svg-data-uri` | |-------------|----------:|-----------------:|--------------------:| | None | 96.459 kB | 103.268 kB | 76.583 kB | | `gzip -9` | 17.902 kB | 13.780 kB | 12.974 kB | | `brotli -Z` | 15.797 kB | 11.693 kB | 10.976 kB | Roughly 6% smaller compressed, but don't write off the ≈20% uncompressed savings either. [Some browser caches decompress before store](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/ieinternals/2014/10/21/compressing-the-web/), and parsing time/memory usage scale linearly with uncompressed filesize. Usage ----- ```js var svgToMiniDataURI = require('mini-svg-data-uri'); var svg = ''; var optimizedSVGDataURI = svgToMiniDataURI(svg); // "data:image/svg+xml,%3csvg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' viewBox='0 0 50 50'%3e%3cpath d='M22 38V51L32 32l19-19v12C44 26 43 10 38 0 52 15 49 39 22 38z'/%3e%3c/svg%3e" ``` You can also [try it in your browser at RunKit](https://npm.runkit.com/mini-svg-data-uri). ### CLI If you have it installed globally, or as some kind of dependency inside your project’s directory: ```sh mini-svg-data-uri file.svg # writes to stdout mini-svg-data-uri file.svg file.svg.uri # writes to the given output filename ``` Use `--help` for more info. ### Warning * This **does not optimize the SVG source file**. You’ll want [svgo](https://github.com/svg/svgo) or its brother [SVGOMG](https://jakearchibald.github.io/svgomg/) for that. * The default output **does not work inside `srcset` attributes**. Use the `.toSrcset` method for that: ```js var srcsetExample = html` `; ``` * The resulting Data URI should be wrapped with double quotes: `url("…")`, ``, etc. * This might change or break SVGs that use `"` in character data, like inside `` or `aria-label` or something. Try curly quotes (`“”`) or `"` instead. FAQ --- ### Don’t you need a `charset` in the MIME Type? `charset` does nothing for Data URIs. The URI can only be the encoding of its parent file — it’s included in it! ### Why lowercase the URL-encoded hex pairs? It compresses slightly better. No, really. Using the same files from earlier: | Compression | Uppercase (`%AF`) | Lowercase (`%af`) | |-------------|------------------:|------------------:| | `gzip -9` | 12.978 kB | 12.974 kB | | `brotli -Z` | 10.988 kB | 10.976 kB | I did say *slightly*. Browser support --------------- * Internet Explorer 9 and up, including Edge * Firefox, Safari, Chrome, whatever else uses their engines * Android WebKit 3+ * Opera Mini’s server-side Presto