The smallest Javascript libraries on the internet ...
Popular Javascript libraries such as
jQuery grew tremendously over the years.
To reduce bandwidth requirements, these libraries are usually minified and GZIP compressed.
Surprisingly, most Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) give you a quite
bad level of GZIP compression.
Google's
Zopfli (open source) is currently the best GZIP compressor and produces the smallest files.
It produces files fully compatible to the DEFLATE algorithm (used by GZIP) but in order to find even better compression
it is based on a random walk (
trial-'n'-error).
I run a brute-force search to find optimal Zopfli parameters.
That means: when decompressed by the browser, my files are 100% identical to the original minified versions.
There is no difference to the developer, to the administrator or to the end-user:
except my files are smaller and therefore load a tiny bit faster.
size(mine) < size(original) but content(mine) = content(original)
Everything you find on the website can be used in in non-commercial as well as commercial projects without any obligations
However, if you are a super-kind person, then please send me a short mail. Or a postcard. Or both.
Libraries
My server analyzed these already minified and zipped projects and compressed them even further:
On average,
my files are
5.57% smaller
than the smallest files you find on these major public content delivery networks:
Baidu,
Boot,
cdnjs,
fastcdn,
Google,
jsdelivr,
Microsoft,
Sina,
unpkg and/or
Yandex.
Not a
single file from these CDNs is smaller or has the same size as my compressed files.
Take a look at some
statistics.
How To Use It
Select your desired library from the table above, for example
jQuery 3.6.1,
and either:
- download the smallest file and store it on your server
- hotlink to my server's copy
As mentioned before, after decompression my files are
100% identical to their original version.
The only difference is I spent much more time finding an (almost) optimal compression.
Fallback Solution
No matter which CDN you use, it's always a good idea to have a fallback in case the CDN is unreachable or - even worse -
delisted your specific library.
All you have to do is to keep a copy of that library on your local server and add the following Javascript code:
Please be aware that
window.jQuery (last line) is specific to jQuery,
for other libraries you have to use their dedicated main Javascript object:
| Library |
Load Local Fallback |
| AngularJS |
<script>window.angular || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/angular.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| BackboneJS |
<script>window.Backbone || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/backbone.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| Bootstrap |
<script>$.fn.modal || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/bootstrap.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| D3 |
<script>window.d3 || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/d3.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| Dojo |
<script>typeof(dojo) !== "undefined" || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/dojo.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| Ember |
<script>window.Ember || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/ember.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| jQuery |
<script>window.jQuery || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/jquery.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| Knockout |
<script>window.ko || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/knockout.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| lodash |
<script>window._ || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/lodash.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| React |
<script>window.React || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/react.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| ThreeJS |
<script>window.THREE || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/three.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
| UnderscoreJS |
<script>window._ || document.write('<script src="local_server_path/underscore.min.js">\x3C/script>')</script> |
You can try another CDN instead of falling back to your local server, too.
Info
I created this website as a hobby project because every time a byte is wasted, a kitten cries. Seriously ;-)
By the way: if you run a small website it's totally fine to hotlink to the compressed files on my server.
However, high-traffic websites should copy my files to their own server.
And in the best of all worlds, major CDNs would replace their (too) large versions ... well, I'm just dreaming.
Notes:
pigz is a fast open source multi-threaded implementation of
gzip
written by one of the original authors of
gzip.
However, when using compression level 11,
pigz actually switches to the slower Zopfli algorithm and isn't multi-threaded anymore.
KrzyMOD's extensions to Zopfli offer the highest level of configuration and is therefore used for my brute-force search.
Ken Silverman wrote the closed-source
KZIP compression program and
Jonathon Fowler ported it to Linux.
Defluff was created by
Joachim Henke;
DeflOpt is a tool by Ben Jos Walbeehm.
website made by Stephan Brumme in
2015
and still improving in 2024.
all timestamps are displayed in central european time. see my
changelog.
no flash, not even images or external css files - and everything squeezed into a single html file.
which was handsomely compressed before releasing it into the wild internet - obviously.
please visit my
homepage and my
blog, too.
email: minime (at) stephan-brumme.com
All trademarks are property of their respective owners. You know, the boring legal stuff.