The JPEG XL Image Coding System: History, Features, Coding Tools, Design Rationale, and Future

Authors: Jon Sneyers, Jyrki Alakuijala, Luca Versari, Zoltan Szabadka, Sami Boukortt, Amnon Cohen-Tidhar, Moritz Firsching, Evgenii Kliuchnikov, Tal Lev-Ami, Eric Portis, Thomas Richter and Osamu Watanabe
Preprint: 2506.05987, 2025
Full text: arXiv

JPEG XL is a new image coding system offering state-of-the-art compression performance, lossless JPEG recompression, and advanced features. It aims to replace JPEG, PNG, GIF, and other formats with a single universal codec. This article provides an overview of JPEG XL, including its history, design rationale, coding tools, and future potential. It can be used as a companion document to the standard (ISO/IEC 18181), or as a standalone article to better understand JPEG XL, either at a high level or in considerable technical detail.