Built because I needed ita compressor I could trust
Asset Melt started as a personal tool — a way to shrink and convert images without handing files to a cloud service. It grew into something I hope is useful for you too.
Why Asset Melt exists
I compress and convert images constantly — for websites, side projects, and client work. Every time I reached for an online tool, the same friction appeared: upload my files, trust someone else's server, hope they delete them, and accept whatever limits the free tier imposed.
I wanted something different: professional results, modern formats like AVIF and WebP, batch processing when a folder of exports lands on my desk — and the certainty that nothing ever leaves my machine.
Google's Squoosh had already shown that WASM codecs in the browser could match server quality. But Squoosh was built for one image at a time, and it is no longer actively maintained. Asset Melt is my answer: the same codec DNA, with the workflow features I actually needed day to day.
What Asset Melt is today
A free, browser-based image studio at assetmelt.com/studio. Drop images, configure a pipeline, compare before/after, and export — individually or as a ZIP. Install it as a PWA for offline use. Read guides on the blog when you want the theory behind the tooling.
How it works
Asset Melt is a static web application — there is no backend that receives your images. When you open Studio, the app downloads WebAssembly codec modules to your browser. Decoding, resizing, cropping, and encoding all run in Web Workers on your CPU. The site is hosted on Vercel, which only delivers the app itself — HTML, JavaScript, and codec bundles. Your images never leave your device, so the host never sees them.
Privacy by architecture
Not a policy checkbox — the app has no upload endpoint. If images leave your machine, it is because you exported them.
Squoosh-grade codecs
MozJPEG, AVIF, WebP, Oxipng, JXL, and QOI via WebAssembly — the same family of engines that proved browser compression works.
Built for real workflows
Batch queues, size budgets, platform presets, and a full transform pipeline — not just one image at a time.
Free forever
No accounts, no subscriptions, no artificial limits. Optional crypto donations help keep the lights on.
Under the hood
The codec stack builds on the open-source ecosystem that powered Squoosh — @jsquash bindings around MozJPEG, libwebp, rav1e, Oxipng, and more. HEIC decoding uses local WASM decoders. The UI is a React app built with TanStack Start and TanStack Router, prerendered for fast loads and search-engine discoverability.
/* shipped without a backend */
Who builds it
Asset Melt is designed, built, and maintained by Mehdi Tareghi, a software engineer. I write the blog, tune the presets, and ship updates. It is an indie project — not a venture-backed startup — which means decisions favor users over growth metrics.
If you want to understand exactly what data the site collects (spoiler: not your images), read the privacy policy.
Ready to try it?
No signup, no upload. Open Studio and drop an image — you will see the difference in seconds.
Open Studio