Turn Off Picture Thumbnails in WordPress & Save Web Server Space

When you publish a blog post that has a screenshot or a picture, WordPress will automatically create two image thumbnails in your uploads folder on the web server.

wordpress image thumbnails

Image thumbnails are required for photo galleries or if you are embedding a smaller image in the blog post that links to the full size version but in other cases, these “extra thumbnails” simply occupy precious space on your web server.

To permanently turn off these image thumbnails, Gene suggested a simple workaround in this WordPress Tips article.

Open your WordPress dashboard, go to Settings -> Miscellaneous Settings and clear the height and width fields under “Thumbnail Size” and “Medium Size.” Save changes and WordPress will no longer create thumbnails.

Amit Agarwal

Amit Agarwal

Google Developer Expert, Google Cloud Champion

Amit Agarwal is a Google Developer Expert in Google Workspace and Google Apps Script. He holds an engineering degree in Computer Science (I.I.T.) and is the first professional blogger in India.

Amit has developed several popular Google add-ons including Mail Merge for Gmail and Document Studio. Read more on Lifehacker and YourStory

Awards & Titles

Digital Inspiration has won several awards since it's launch in 2004.

Google Developer Expert

Google Developer Expert

Google awarded us the Google Developer Expert award recogizing our work in Google Workspace.

ProductHunt Golden Kitty

ProductHunt Golden Kitty

Our Gmail tool won the Lifehack of the Year award at ProductHunt Golden Kitty Awards in 2017.

Microsoft MVP Alumni

Microsoft MVP Alumni

Microsoft awarded us the Most Valuable Professional (MVP) title for 5 years in a row.

Google Cloud Champion

Google Cloud Champion

Google awarded us the Champion Innovator title recognizing our technical skill and expertise.

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