The lesser known version of SVG icons is the smaller, compressed, SVGZ format. Here’s how to use SVGZ in Office 365/2019 despite no direct support for the format.
Most SVG icons arrived uncompressed in plain XML text using the .SVG extension. We’ve shown before how SVG’s can be edited in any text editor to make changes not possible in Office itself.
SVGZ is just an SVG file that’s been compressed using the common gzip format. Most compression utilities like WinZip and our favorite WinRAR support gzip (extension .gz ). Compressing an SVG can make it a lot smaller, our test SVG image is around 90% smaller as an SVGZ. SVGZ images are supported on all major browsers.
Making an SVGZ work in Word and Office
Office does NOT support SVGZ images which is a pity, but easily overcome. In short, unpack the SVG from the compressed SVGZ.
Download the .SVGZ to your computer then rename with an extra .gz extension. For example, MYicon.svgz becomes MYicon.svgz.gz
Right-click on the renamed file to see what programs on your computer support gzip.
Open the SVGZ in a compatible program and you’ll see there’s a .SVG inside.
Extract / Save the SVG to your computer then Office will be able to open it, as usual, via Insert | Picture.
If your Office doesn’t support SVG, never fear, see Converting SVG into JPG, PNG or other raster image format
Edit options for SVG Icons in Office 365/2019
Finding more SVG or Icons for Office
