Dependent Media Live Rates for USPS vs Smush – Image Optimization, Compression, Lazy Load, WebP & CDN

Dependent Media Live Rates for USPS calculates real-time USPS shipping rates at checkout using your own USPS Developer Portal credentials, by talking directly to the USPS REST API (the current API — not the retired Web Tools API). This plugin is not affiliated with or endorsed by the United States Postal Service. “USPS” is a trademark of the United States Postal Service and is used in this plugin’s name solely to describe the service the plugin integrates with. Domestic US USPS Ground Advantage USPS Priority Mail USPS Priority Mail Express International USPS First-Class Package International USPS Priority Mail International USPS Priority Mail Express International Other features Per-product weight and dimensions, with configurable defaults for products that have none set Separate domestic and international service toggles — enable only what you want to offer Automatic routing: the plugin detects destination country and hits the right USPS endpoint Multi-box packing by default — each cart line item is rated as its own package and costs are summed. Heavy lines are automatically split across multiple boxes to stay within USPS weight caps. A “combined” mode is also available for stores that genuinely ship everything in one box. Only services that price every box are offered — partial coverage would produce a misleading total Optional fallback flat rate if the USPS API is unreachable Debug logging via WooCommerce → Status → Logs You bring your own USPS API credentials This plugin does not proxy rate requests through any third party. You register your store as a USPS Developer Portal application once, paste the Consumer Key and Consumer Secret into the plugin settings, and rates go directly from USPS to your site. There is no monthly fee and no per-request cost. Register at: https://developers.usps.com/ Privacy When a customer reaches checkout, the plugin sends the destination postal code (and country, for international) along with the package dimensions and weight to the USPS REST API at apis.usps.com. No customer name, email, or other personally identifying information is transmitted. OAuth2 access tokens are cached locally in a WordPress transient. Source code Development happens on GitHub: https://github.com/Dependent-Media/dm-usps-shipping. Issues and pull requests welcome. External services This plugin connects to the USPS (United States Postal Service) REST API to obtain live shipping rates at WooCommerce checkout. This is the entire purpose of the plugin: without this connection, no rates can be calculated. What is the service? The USPS REST API at https://apis.usps.com, operated by the United States Postal Service. The plugin uses two endpoints: POST /oauth2/v3/token — to obtain an OAuth2 access token using the merchant’s USPS Developer Portal Consumer Key and Consumer Secret. POST /prices/v3/total-rates/search and POST /international-prices/v3/total-rates/search — to obtain shipping rates for a given package. What data is sent, and when? When a customer reaches the WooCommerce shipping calculation step (typically the Cart or Checkout page), the plugin sends, for each package being rated: the origin ZIP code (configured by the merchant), the destination postal code, the destination country, and the package weight, length, width, and height. When the plugin needs to authenticate to the USPS API (the first time, and again when the cached token has expired), it sends the merchant’s USPS Consumer Key and Consumer Secret to the OAuth2 token endpoint. No customer name, email address, IP address, or other personally identifying information is transmitted to USPS by this plugin. Who provides the service? The United States Postal Service. USPS Developer Portal Terms and Conditions: https://developers.usps.com/terms-and-conditions USPS Privacy Policy: https://www.usps.com/privacypolicy/ Is the use of this service required? Yes. Calculating live USPS rates is the plugin’s only function, and it cannot be performed without contacting the USPS REST API. Merchants who do not wish to use this service should not install or activate this plugin.

Compress images, optimize images, and enable image lazy load automatically with the powerful Smush image optimizer to keep your WordPress site fast, without losing quality. Smush makes it easy to optimize images, compress images, and deliver images faster across your entire WordPress site. This all-in-one image optimizer automatically reduces image file sizes, enables image lazy load, and serves modern formats like WebP and AVIF, all without breaking image quality or adding extra work. Whether you’re running a blog, store, or portfolio, Smush helps you optimize images at scale and keep your site fast with a trusted WordPress image optimizer. Trusted by 1+ Million Sites | 4.8/5 Star Rating Get everything you need to optimize images and speed up your site. Smush works out of the box with no complicated setup – just install and let it handle the rest. Compress images without losing quality Reduce image file size automatically while keeping your images sharp and clear. Smush is an easy-to-use image optimizer which let’s you compress images using both lossless and lossy compression, giving you the best balance of quality and performance without extra work. You can also compress images outside the media library using Directory Smush, making it easy to optimize images stored in theme folders, plugins, or other directories on your server. Lazy load images for faster pages Enable image lazy load across your site so images load only when needed. This image optimizer improves initial page speed and creates a smoother experience for visitors without extra configuration. Serve WebP and AVIF images automatically (PRO) Convert images to WebP and AVIF and serve them automatically to supported browsers. Smush helps you optimize images using next-gen formats to reduce file size and improve load times across your WordPress site. Deliver images faster with an Image CDN (PRO) Serve images through a global image CDN to reduce latency and improve load times for visitors around the world. 119 global CDN servers Up to 500 GB of bandwidth Faster image delivery based on visitor location Improved performance for image-heavy and high-traffic sites Automatically resize and fix image dimensions (PRO) Eliminate common PageSpeed warnings and improve layout stability with automatic image sizing. Smush dynamically resizes images to perfectly fit their containers, regardless of original size, helping fix the “Properly size images” warning in Google PageSpeed Insights. It also automatically adds missing width and height attributes to your images, improving rendering speed and reducing layout shifts. This helps you meet the “Ensure images have explicit width and height” recommendation without any manual work. Optimize your entire site, automatically Smush works across your whole site as a powerful image optimizer to optimize images as you upload them and maintain performance over time without manual work. Optimize images automatically on upload Compress images in bulk or individually Works with your existing media library No need to re-upload images Enable image lazy load across your site Convert images to WebP and AVIF Deliver images with an integrated image CDN Automatically resize and serve correctly sized images Optimize images outside the media library with Directory Smush Built for performance Smush improves page speed and overall performance by reducing image weight and improving how images are delivered. Reduce page load times Improve user experience Better performance for image-heavy pages Supports image lazy load and preload images (PRO) for faster perceived performance Works with your existing setup Smush is built to work with your current WordPress setup, including popular themes, page builders, and plugins. Compatible with Gutenberg, Elementor, WPBakery, and more Works with WooCommerce stores No need to change your workflow Easy to enable and configure Designed to be simple You don’t need to be a performance expert to optimize images with Smush image optimizer. Works out of the box Simple settings when you need them No technical knowledge required Safe to use on any site Why choose Smush? There are plenty of image optimization plugins, but Smush focuses on making it easy to optimize images, compress images, and improve performance without complexity. As a leading WordPress image optimizer, Smush gives you powerful optimization tools without the technical hassle. Trusted by over 1 million WordPress users Built specifically for WordPress Regular updates and improvements Backed by the WPMU DEV team Get started in minutes Install Smush, activate it, and start to compress images, optimize images, and enable image lazy load right away. This easy-to-use image optimizer helps most sites see improvements immediately without changing how they upload or manage images. About Us WPMU DEV is a premium supplier of quality WordPress plugins, services and support. Learn more here: https://wpmudev.com/ Don’t forget to stay up to date on everything WordPress from the Internet’s number one resource: WPMU DEV Blog Hey, one more thing… we hope you enjoy our free offerings as much as we’ve loved making them for you! Contact and Credits Originally written by Alex Dunae at Dialect (dialect.ca, e-mail ‘alex’ at ‘dialect dot ca’), 2008-11.