It is agreed that a picture or its image conveys information more than a textual message of a book of thousand pages. Image Processing is considered to be one of the most rapidly evolving areas of information technology today, with growing applications in all facets of life. This technology holds the possibility of developing the ultimate machine in the future that would be able to perform the visual functions of human beings. Image Processing has already been in use in medical, industrial, remote sensing, space and defense applications. Considering of the volume of data to be handled, image compression techniques play a vital role in any image processing system. Several researchers have contributed in a big way to accelerate the utility of image processing. The transport of images across communication paths used to be an expensive in terms of bandwidth which need to be optimally utilized. Image compression provides an option for reducing the number of bits in transmission. This in turn helps increase
the volume of data transferred in a given time, thereby reducing the cost of transmission. With increase in the volume of data traffic, most of the computer networks have begun to exceed their capacity for transmission. Image compression techniques thus have become increasingly important in minimizing such traffic congestions and need to be pursued. This paper reviews all the techniques, which have advanced the image compression.
