Quick question: I notice using PageSpeed that when I use an image from Unsplash, it remains hosted at Unsplash. (And it doesn’t appear to be optimized.)
Would it be better for me to d/l the image from Unsplash, then upload it as the featured image?
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Yes 
As you already pointed out, Unsplash doesn’t optimise anything. It just loads an external image.
If you download and upload to your Ghost site it does get processed AND served through the CDN your lovely host provides 
I use black lenses and I like to be the devil’s advocate from time to time, so keep in mind that all the Ghost integrations are primarily motivated by commercial agreements.
That’s not inherently bad, but it could interfere with self-hosting, performance, and genuine user experiences.
Everyone can switch because the code is open-source, and we have people like Cathy, Jannis, and everyone around here building super cool stuff to use with Ghost.
The core is solid, and it’s what it is. I like the challenges that breaking their matrix brings.
Definitely download and re-upload. Beyond the optimization jannis mentioned, Unsplash-hosted images also add an extra DNS lookup and TLS handshake on first load, which can add 200-400ms on mobile. When you upload locally, Ghost automatically generates responsive srcset variants (different sizes for different screens) and serves them through your CDN. That combo alone usually knocks a few seconds off LCP on image-heavy posts. One thing to watch: make sure you’re compressing before upload too. Unsplash originals can be 5-10MB, and even Ghost’s processing won’t shrink them as aggressively as running them through something like Squoosh or TinyPNG first.
Unsplash images should also be generating srcset using Unsplash’s CDN with images sized to the same sizes as local images and correctly optimised; the original source images on Unsplash are never used. There should be very little difference between the two on the optimisation side.
If you’re seeing something different to that, please raise it because it’s likely a bug.
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