How can I change which image size ‘Featured Image’ uses?

  • I have a page that displays my posts in a grid, with 5 posts wide, and using the ‘featured image’ feature to present the featured image of the post. Obviously, the images are small, as there are 5 across. But nowhere can I find a way to tell WP to use one of the smaller ‘thumbnail’ or smaller image sizes; I’ve checked and I can see that it is displaying the ‘scaled’ image for the featured image display, which is 2560x in size. When I use the media browser to choose the featured image, I only get to choose ‘which’ image, not which ‘size’ variant of that image gets used. And when I design the basic page layout, I simply choose to use ‘featured image’; I don’t get to say which size should be used there either.

    What is the point of having 6 or more size variants of every uploaded image if the largest (2560x) is always going to be used? How can I tell WP to use one of the smaller variants of the image?

Viewing 7 replies - 1 through 7 (of 7 total)
  • Moderator t-p

    (@t-p)

    Check out this plugin and see if it can work for you: https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/show-featured-image-size-in-admin-topbar/

    Thread Starter steerpike58

    (@steerpike58)

    Hi there – thanks for the plugin. I installed it, but I’m not seeing anything useful. After first installing, I roam around the site and I see ‘Featured Image Size: not set’ everywhere I go. Then I noticed there is a ‘settings’ option in the plugin, so I visit that, and I see

    ‘please set up featured image size. For example, “1200×600” – what’s the point of that? I’m expecting the plugin to TELL me what the dimensions are, so why would I type in 1200×600?

    But I typed in 1200×600 anyway, just to comply, and now, I see ‘Featured Image Size: 1200×600’ on every page, regardless of the actual featured image.

    Something is not right!

    Moderator t-p

    (@t-p)

    If you have question about that or any plugin, please ask in that plugin’s dedicated support forum.

    Thread Starter steerpike58

    (@steerpike58)

    Ah – my apologies – I’ll post the plug-in question there.

    In the meantime, though – while that plugin may help me by SHOWING me the current featured image size, I already know that, in the test cases I’ve been using, the featured images are the 2560x versions of the image. So the question I’m trying to answer is – what is the point of WP creating several different sizes, only to use the biggest size when showing 5 featured images side-by-side on a page (I’m guessing a 500x or at most 1000x image would be more than adequate).

    And is there any way for me to control what sized variant of the image is used? As noted, when I upload an image, WP auto-generates a 150x, a 300x, a 768x, a 1024x, variant for use in exactly this type of situation. But when I choose the featured image, I only get to choose the ‘general image’, not any particular sized version.

    Are you using a custom theme or a premium theme ?

    Thread Starter steerpike58

    (@steerpike58)

    Neither custom nor premium – I’m using a free theme – ‘Fewer’. It is quite minimalistic. But I’ve also tested with ‘twentytwentyfour’ and ‘Bute’ (all free). I understand now that ‘core’ WP will create a bunch of different sized image variants when you upload a single image, and your chosen theme can add to that – so I understand ‘how’ I’m getting 6 variants of an image when I upload one image.

    But what I don’t understand is – how do you ‘use’ (or how does WP use) any of these smaller variants if you stick to using the block editor (I understand that I could place a ‘hard reference’ to /wp-content/uploads/year/mo/<specific file name>, but I want to avoid that). In the block editor, when I choose to display an image on my page, I choose it from the Media Gallery, and the image is displayed. I don’t get asked whether I want the big, medium, small, etc variant. I was assuming that WP would be smart enough to choose the specific variant based on situation – if I’m in a ‘grid’ of 5 wide images, I clearly don’t need a 2560x version of an image. But that’s what WP seems to be using for the featured image.

    So I basically understand how I’m getting 6 size-variants of a single image, but what I don’t have any sense of is, how is WP supposed to be ‘using’ those 6 variants – what is the point of their existence?

    Thread Starter steerpike58

    (@steerpike58)

    UPDATE – I just read this helpful article – WordPress Image Sizes Explained (And How to Add Custom Sizes) (wpmudev.com) . In the article, they describe how you CAN select the specific image size when you add an image from the gallery when using the Block editor, and I see it – ‘Full’, ‘Large’, ‘Medium’, ‘Thumbnail’ are properties on the right. So that’s good to know – I can manually choose, if I wish, when creating the post or page. The article also describes how “WP added responsive images to core WP in 4.4” – “It offers this list (of different image sizes for a given image) to the browser so it can select an image that is appropriate for the visitor’s device. If the visitor is using a mobile device, they’ll receive a smaller image in the?srcset” . This is all very informative and makes sense, but when I just tested on my mobile device, I was given the ‘full’ sized image, despite the existence of much smaller variants in the ‘set’. The article also describes how ‘featured images’ are supposed to use the ‘thumbnail’ variant; but again, my testing is showing that the ‘full’ (2560x) variant is being used in the ‘featured image’.

    So is this really working for anyone? Has anyone ever validated that the smaller image variants are used when appropriate?

Viewing 7 replies - 1 through 7 (of 7 total)
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