SVGA vs Lottie vs animated WebP for live-app effects
Which animation format to use for gifts, frames and entrances: how SVGA, Lottie and animated WebP compare on file size, transparency, sound and per-user layers.
The short answer
For gifts, entrances, frames and vehicles in a live app, SVGA is the usual choice: it carries bitmap effects with real transparency, it can include sound, and its layers can be swapped for the user's avatar and name. Lottie is excellent for vector UI motion. Animated WebP is fine for small previews and stickers.
Lottie
Lottie stores vector shapes and keyframes as JSON exported from After Effects. It is light and sharp for icons, loaders and illustrations, but glowing particles, fire, light rays and photographic textures, which are most of what makes a gift feel expensive, either cannot be expressed or become heavy. Lottie has no built-in sound.
Animated WebP and GIF
Animated WebP keeps every frame as a picture, so file size grows with length and resolution, and there are no layers to personalise and no sound. GIF is worse still: 256 colours and only on-or-off transparency. Both are good for thumbnails and previews, which is how this store uses them.
SVGA
SVGA keeps each picture once and stores the motion as instructions, so a long, rich effect stays small. It has full alpha, optional audio, and named layers that the app can replace at run time. Players exist for Android, iOS, Flutter, React Native and the web.