JPEG XL returns to Chrome
Google has announced that Chrome 155 will support decoding JPEG XL images, bringing the .jxl format into the browser through an implementation written primarily in Rust. The Chrome team says the format can provide stronger compression than conventional JPEG while adding lossless operation, native high-dynamic-range support and reversible transcoding of existing JPEG files.
According to Google's October 7 announcement, JPEG XL can reduce file size by roughly 30% to 50% compared with JPEG, depending on the material and settings. The company positions it alongside AVIF rather than as a universal replacement, recommending that developers test both. It expects JPEG XL to be particularly useful for high-quality or lossless photography and for experiences that benefit from detailed progressive decoding.
The decoder is jxl-rs, a pure-Rust implementation integrated into Chrome. Image decoders operate on complex, untrusted binary data received from the network, making them an important browser attack surface. Google says choosing Rust addresses classes of memory errors associated with unsafe memory handling at the source, while Chrome's sandbox and other defenses remain additional layers.
Performance and compatibility work
Memory safety was only one requirement. A production codec also needs to use the vector-processing capabilities of modern processors without giving up portability. The Chrome team says stabilization work in Rust enabled safe use of SIMD instructions, while a separate abstraction layer called jxl_simd was influenced by Highway, a C++ library originally developed for the reference libjxl codec. Unsafe operations are confined to a small number of reviewed locations.
Performance work also borrowed ideas from libjxl, including processing techniques for operations that cross image-region boundaries and efforts to avoid unnecessary data copies. Google tracks the Rust decoder on multiple hardware platforms and says it has tested the implementation through fuzzing and code review. The company reported finding no memory-safety defect across the implementation's history, though that claim describes its testing record rather than a guarantee that no defect can exist.
Browser interoperability shaped the decision as well. Google cited repeated requests from web developers, including support for JPEG XL in standards-focused Interop proposals. Chrome participated in a 2026 interoperability investigation designed to establish cross-browser test coverage for the format, and Google says Chrome passes those tests.
Support in a browser does not automatically make a format suitable for every deployment. Publishers still need fallbacks for clients without compatible decoders and must compare real images, encoding time and delivery costs. Chrome 155 nonetheless gives developers another major client on which to evaluate JPEG XL for photographs, animation and archival-quality web assets.
