# joe-bell/plaiceholder

Beautiful image placeholders, without the hassle.

Repository: https://github.com/joe-bell/plaiceholder
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/plaiceholder
Homepage: https://plaiceholder.co
Language: TypeScript
License: Apache-2.0
License Family: permissive
Topics: blurhash, placeholder, plaiceholder, css, lqip, image-optimisation, tailwindcss
Archived: true
Last push: 2023-05-24T17:31:36+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 10/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-02T17:46:02.011165+00:00)
- activity 0, release rhythm 8, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 2135, "days_push": 1197, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: archived
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 2318, forks 74 (observed 2026-08-28T04:06:36.998021+00:00)

## What it is
Plaiceholder is a server-side TypeScript library for generating low-quality image placeholders (LQIP) as colors, CSS gradients, SVG, or Base64 strings, built on Sharp. It ships plugins for Next.js and Tailwind CSS and is now feature-complete in maintenance mode.

## Use cases
- generate low quality image placeholders for a website
- add blur-up loading placeholders to Next.js images
- create CSS gradient placeholders from images
- get dominant color from an image in Node.js
- generate base64 LQIP thumbnails at build time
- use image placeholders with Tailwind CSS

## When to choose
- you want multiple LQIP output formats (color, CSS, SVG, base64) from one tool
- you use Next.js or Tailwind CSS and want ready-made integrations
- you need small, fast placeholders to improve perceived load performance

## When to avoid
- you need client-side/browser placeholder generation
- your project uses CommonJS (plaiceholder is ESM-only)
- you need active development or new features (project is in maintenance mode)
- you need fine-grained Sharp control beyond the exposed options

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: maintenance
- function: image-processing, ui-components, css-framework
- domain: web-development, frontend, image-processing, performance
- platform: serverless
- tags: lqip, blurhash, image-placeholders, sharp, nextjs, tailwindcss, esm-only, base64, svg, nodejs, web-server

## Member repositories
- joe-bell/plaiceholder (main) score 10

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:06:36.998021+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T02:38:54.324289+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/joe-bell/plaiceholder (fetched 2026-08-28T04:06:36.998021+00:00, sha 5839e98d6e0b)
  - homepage: https://plaiceholder.co (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.738158+00:00, sha d062341a1313)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/getting-started (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.746883+00:00, sha 918dcfcfe90b)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/upgrading-to-3 (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.748553+00:00, sha 41873c759059)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/usage (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.750320+00:00, sha 9d7a768cc0db)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/plugins/next (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.751992+00:00, sha 968f36e29d49)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/plugins/tailwind (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.753442+00:00, sha bd3b4483f874)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/examples/astro (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.755264+00:00, sha 598bed21db4f)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/examples/next (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.757049+00:00, sha cca817e06e08)
  - site_page: https://plaiceholder.co/docs/faqs (fetched 2026-08-29T10:19:40.758662+00:00, sha 03fb89fad6c6)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.