Coil
Kotlin-native image loading library for Android — the modern, coroutine-first replacement for Glide and Picasso. Coil (Coroutine Image Loader) provides: memory and disk caching, network image loading with OkHttp, image transformations (blur, grayscale, crop), GIF/SVG/video frame support, and Jetpack Compose integration (AsyncImage composable). Built for Kotlin with coroutines — all operations are suspend functions. Lighter weight than Glide (~1500 methods vs Glide's ~5000+). Coil 3.0 adds Compose Multiplatform support for iOS.
Score Breakdown
⚙ Agent Friendliness
🔒 Security
HTTPS enforced by Android by default. OkHttp handles certificate validation. Auth for private images via OkHttp interceptors. Disk cache is in app private storage — protected by app sandbox. No credentials stored by Coil itself.
⚡ Reliability
Best When
You're building a Kotlin Android app with Jetpack Compose that needs image loading — Coil's Compose-native AsyncImage and coroutine integration make it the recommended choice for modern Android.
Avoid When
You have an existing large Glide-based codebase (migration cost), need advanced image processing pipelines, or target platforms beyond Android.
Use Cases
- • Load agent-generated images and thumbnails in Android app using AsyncImage composable — Coil handles caching, loading states, and error fallback automatically
- • Display agent avatar/profile images with memory and disk caching using Coil — ImageLoader with configurable cache sizes for agent content feeds
- • Load SVG icons for agent UI using Coil's SVG decoder — coil-svg dependency adds SVG support without manual parsing
- • Load GIF animations for agent status indicators using Coil's GIF support — coil-gif dependency with repeatCount configuration
- • Transform agent images with Coil's built-in transformations — BlurTransformation, CircleCropTransformation, RoundedCornersTransformation for agent profile images
Not For
- • Non-Android platforms — Coil 2.x is Android-specific; Coil 3.0 supports Compose Multiplatform for iOS/Desktop but is newer and less battle-tested
- • Teams with existing Glide investment — Glide has more image transformation options and is more battle-tested for complex image processing pipelines; migration cost may not be worth it
- • Server-side image processing — Coil is Android client-side; use ImageIO (Java) or Sharp (Node.js) for server-side image manipulation
Interface
Authentication
Image loading library — no auth concepts. Authenticated image URLs handled by customizing Coil's OkHttpClient with interceptors for Bearer token or signed URL support.
Pricing
Coil is Apache 2.0 licensed, maintained by Colin White and contributors. Free for all use.
Agent Metadata
Known Gotchas
- ⚠ AsyncImage requires stable key to recompose correctly — if URL changes dynamically, AsyncImage recomposes with new request; ensure URL stability for agent profile images to avoid unnecessary network requests
- ⚠ Disk cache vs memory cache sizing — Coil's default cache sizes may be too small for agent content-heavy apps; configure ImageLoader with DiskCache.Builder().maxSizeBytes(500 * 1024 * 1024) for larger caches
- ⚠ HTTPS required for non-localhost URLs — Android 9+ blocks cleartext HTTP by default; agent image URLs must use HTTPS or configure network_security_config.xml for development
- ⚠ OkHttpClient injection for auth — custom auth headers require injecting a custom OkHttpClient into ImageLoader; Coil uses its own OkHttpClient by default; not injecting shared client creates duplicate connection pools
- ⚠ GIF and SVG require extra dependencies — coil-gif and coil-svg are separate artifacts; adding coil without the extension causes GIFs to load as static images without error; add extension for animated/vector agent content
- ⚠ Compose multiplatform in Coil 3.x has different imports — Coil 3 changed package names and API for multiplatform; don't mix Coil 2.x documentation with Coil 3.x code; check version when following tutorials
Alternatives
Full Evaluation Report
Detailed scoring breakdown, competitive positioning, security analysis, and improvement recommendations for Coil.
Scores are editorial opinions as of 2026-03-06.