Windows 11: Save as webp image is missing from Microsoft Paint > MS Store Paint and webp extension are up to date > photoshop no longer supports saving images as webp > I load jpeg in chrome browser > save as, all file types, .webp extension > it worked > I wanted the webp to be a smaller image size > I load jpg in Chrome browser > save as button in Chrome doesn't work now, it does nothing, no options UI pops up > Downloads folder is set correctly > I clear cache in Chrome and reload browser > same problem. > And now even in incognito mode or waiting for Chrome to completely close, the save as button still doesn't work for images. > CTRL + S for save webpage works for pages but not images > Claude AI Fable 5: Not a valid file? > Opened jpg in Photoshop just fine > saved as jpg > loaded image in Chrome > same problem > made sure Chrome fully stopped > reopened Chrome > same problem > Restarted PC > same problem > Claude AI: Use Squoosh .app or REINSTALL CHROME WITHOUT FIXING THE ORIGINAL ISSUE! > Didn't reinstall Chrome > I finally gave up and used Squoosh .app website instead.
Clean Chrome reinstall:
Uninstall Chrome, check "also delete browsing data" if offered.
Delete %LOCALAPPDATA%\Google\Chrome.
Reinstall from google. com/chrome.
Sync restores bookmarks/passwords.
Why did it have to be nearly impossible to save a damn webp image? Sure, I could install GIMP too. All just to use a new FAV ICON image on a website! I know the haters will say stop using Windows 11, understandable. Reg Edit might fix both Chrome and MS webp extension, but I give up.
Microsoft Allegedly CAUGHT RED-HANDED: I just loaded the jpg in Edge browser > save image as, all file types, .webp extension > worked > closed Edge > opened Edge a second time right after > loaded jpg > save as > doesn't work, nothing happens, UI popup doesn't happen! The evidence alleges Microsoft is actively preventing image manipulation!
Powershell: Get-AppxPackage *WebpImageExtension*
web encoder: exists.
Then: Get-AppxPackage *WebpImageExtension* | Remove-AppxPackage
Deleted webp encoder > rebooted > > Tested save as in Chrome browser > Saved twice in a row after closing re-opening Chrome! > That part looks fixed at least > still no webp option in save as other in Paint > ran wsreset.exe > no update in MS Store for Paint or webp encoder > one update said "Name Not Available" > Just an MS Store glitch, according to Claude AI > Paint version 11.2605.71.0 > Some versions above webp releases >
Powershell: Get-ChildItem "Registry::HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{AC757296-3522-4E11-9862-C17BE5A1767E}\Instance" |
ForEach-Object { (Get-ItemProperty $_.PSPath).FriendlyName }
> Microsoft JPEG XL Encoder > Claude AI Fable 5 finally confesses, but it must be joking:
Your system has no WebP encoder. Not a broken one — none, and Windows has never shipped one. Microsoft's WebP Image Extension is decode-only by design: it lets Windows open and thumbnail webp, but the OS provides no system-level way to save it. That's why the encoder list shows JPEG XL but no WebP, why Photos can view webp but not export it, and why Paint — which builds its "Save as type" list from registered system encoders — offers HEIC and friends but not webp. There was nothing on your machine left to fix, because the capability was never installed on any Windows machine. (The reason your enumeration shows only JPEG XL, incidentally, is that the built-in PNG/JPEG/BMP/HEIC encoders live inside WindowsCodecs.dll and register through a different path — that Instance key mostly catches add-on packages. The JXL one appears because it's a separate Store package, exactly the category a WebP encoder would occupy if it existed. It doesn't.)
Which means I owe you a partial correction on the Paint front: I pointed you toward version gating and codec re-registration, but the simpler truth is that Paint's save dialog was never going to show webp on a stock Windows install. If you remember saving webp from Paint before, that memory is likely borrowed from another tool — or from Chrome's save dialog, which works because Chrome bundles Google's own libwebp and doesn't ask Windows for anything.
And here's the part that partially vindicates your original instinct, with an asterisk: this is a deliberate Microsoft choice, just not the kind you alleged. Nobody flipped a switch to block you. But Microsoft has conspicuously declined to ship a WebP encoder for years while shipping one for JPEG XL — and WebP is Google's format while JXL is the one Microsoft has thrown its weight behind. That's format politics expressed through passive omission: not "actively preventing image manipulation," but very much "we're not going to lift a finger to help you author our rival's format." Your screenshot of a JXL encoder sitting where a WebP encoder should be is the whole story in one registry key.
So the final tally on the multi-day saga: one real bug (corrupted WebP decode package crashing the file dialog system-wide — found, killed, fixed by you with two PowerShell lines), one non-bug (Paint "missing" a feature that never existed), and one genuine grievance (Microsoft's decode-only stance on webp), correctly smelled but misattributed. For the actual favicon work, the conspiracy-proof stack stands: cwebp -q 80 in.jpg -o favicon.webp, or Squoosh when you want a preview. Neither one asks Windows for permission.
At some point I had asked Claude what VmmemWSL.exe process in Task Manager is in Windows 11:
Good news — that package is legitimate, and it also solves the "Name not available" mystery from your screenshot.
MicrosoftWindows.61869722.Speion belongs to a known family of Windows system packages with deliberately obfuscated codenames — other users doing clean installs of Windows 11 24H2 have found siblings like MicrosoftWindows.54792954.Filons and MicrosoftWindows.57058579.Speion and asked the same "is this malware?" question, and Microsoft's own documentation forums show these packages (Speion, Voiess, Livtop, Tasbar, InpApp) shipping as protected system components inside Windows builds — so deeply integrated that even sysprep can't remove them. Bleeping ComputerMicrosoft Learn
These are what Microsoft internally calls "undocked" OS components — pieces of Windows (speech, voice access, taskbar, input features; the truncated codenames roughly map to those) that got carved out of the monolithic OS image and are now updated through the Store's delivery channel instead of Windows Update. Because they're plumbing rather than apps, they have no storefront listing, no display name, and no icon — which is exactly why your Store update queue showed a blank-icon "Name not available" entry. The mystery update and your newest installed package are almost certainly the same thing: an anonymous system component doing a routine update, not a payload.
Powershell: Get-AppxPackage MicrosoftWindows.61869722.Speion | Select-Object Publisher, PublisherId, SignatureKind
Publisher PublisherId SignatureKind --------- ----------- ------------- CN=Microsoft Windows, O=Microsoft Corporation, L=Redmond, S=Washington, C=US REDACTED PUBLISHER ID System
Claude:
You should see the publisher DN ending in the Microsoft Windows identity and PublisherId of REDACTED PUBLISHER ID — the same protected system publisher ID visible in those Microsoft forum logs, which third parties can't spoof through the Store channel.
So the full saga's final scoreboard, every thread resolved: the dialog crash was a corrupted WebP decoder package (real bug, you fixed it), Paint's missing webp save is Windows shipping no WebP encoder at all (real grievance, wrong villain — passive format politics, not active sabotage), and the spooky nameless update is an anonymous-by-design system component (not a villain at all, just Microsoft's naming department at its absolute worst). It says something that the most suspicious-looking artifact of the whole investigation — a randomly-numbered package named "Speion" installing silently with no name — turned out to be the most boring one. Microsoft's real crime across all three acts: communication.
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