On Magento 2 when we submit ajax request we can add “showLoader: true” below code in ajax call and trigger processStart and processStop will show and hide loading image

$('body').trigger('processStart');                    
$.ajax({
    url: url,
    type: "POST",
    data: formdata,
    async: true,
    contentType: false,
    showLoader: true,
    success: function (result) {                            
        $('body').trigger('processStop');
    }
});