Import and use an Image in a React component

Import and use an Image in a React component #

To import and use an image in a React component:

1. Import the local image, e.g. import MyImage from './thumbnail.webp';.
2. Pass the imported image to the src prop on the img element.
3. For example, <img src={MyImage} alt="horse" />.

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// 👇️ import the image
import MyImage from './thumbnail.webp';

export default function App() {
  return (
    <div>
      {/* 👇️ local image */}
      <img src={MyImage} alt="horse" />

      {/* 👇️ external image */}
      <img
        src="https://bobbyhadz.com/images/blog/react-prevent-multiple-button-clicks/thumbnail.webp"
        alt="car"
      />
    </div>
  );
}

We used an ES6 default import to import an image in a React application.

The alt prop helps screen readers understand what the image is about.

Notice that the image that is self-closing - <img />.

The example assumes that you have an image named thumbnail.webp in the same folder as the App component.

For example, if you are importing an image from one directory up, you would import as import MyImage from '../thumbnail.webp'.

The image has to be located in the src directory of your project.

You can use this approach to import and use png, svg, webp, jpg, etc, images in your React app.

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// 👇️ import SVG image
import MyImage from './logo.svg';

export default function App() {
  return (
    <div>
      {/* 👇️ local image */}
      <img src={MyImage} alt="logo" />

      {/* 👇️ external image */}
      <img
        src="https://bobbyhadz.com/images/blog/react-prevent-multiple-button-clicks/thumbnail.webp"
        alt="car"
      />
    </div>
  );
}

If your images are located in the public directory, use an absolute path when setting the src prop on the img element.

For example, if you have an image located at public/images/thumbnail.webp, you would set the src of the img to "/images/thumbnail.webp".

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export default function App() {
  return (
    <div>
      {/* 👇️ local image */}
      <img src="/images/thumbnail.webp" alt="horse" />

      {/* 👇️ external image */}
      <img
        src="https://bobbyhadz.com/images/blog/react-prevent-multiple-button-clicks/thumbnail.webp"
        alt="car"
      />
    </div>
  );
}

If you aren't able to use the ES6 import/export syntax in your setup, try using require().

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export default function App() {
  return (
    <div>
      {/* 👇️ local image */}
      <img src={require('./thumbnail.webp')} alt="horse" />
      <img src={require('./logo.svg').default} alt="horse" />
    </div>
  );
}

The example above uses the require() syntax to import 2 images located in the same directory as the App component.

If you need to display an image from an external URL, set the src prop on the img tag to the complete URL of the image.

Copied!
export default function App() {
  return (
    <div>
      <img
        src="https://bobbyhadz.com/images/blog/react-prevent-multiple-button-clicks/thumbnail.webp"
        alt="car"
      />
    </div>
  );
}

The example shows how to display an image from an external URL.

We used the img tag and set it's src prop to the complete URL that points to the image.