How do you enable gzip/Brotli compression for HTTP responses?

Q: How do you enable gzip/Brotli compression for HTTP responses?

**TL;DR.** Compress responses based on the client's Accept-Encoding header using zlib (gzip/brotli) or Express's compression middleware. **Brotli** compresses smaller but costs more CPU; you typically **skip** already-compressed assets (images, video) and tiny payloads, and often offload compression to a reverse proxy/CDN. Accept-Encoding: br, gzip compress br

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Compressing responses via zlib or compression middleware.

nodejshttpcompressionperformance

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Read the code

Compression middleware with a filter

import compression from 'compression';

app.use(compression({
  threshold: 1024,                      // skip tiny bodies
  filter: (req, res) => {
    if (req.headers['x-no-compression']) return false;
    return compression.filter(req, res); // skips already-compressed types
  },
}));

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