Compress an image
Shrink a photo until it fits, and see exactly what it costs before you download it.
Free · No sign-up · Your file never leaves your computer
No file handy? — generated here, not downloaded.
How to use it
- 1
Add a JPG, PNG or WEBP.
- 2
Set the quality. Around 70% is the usual sweet spot — most of the saving, almost none of the visible loss.
- 3
Cap the width too if it is going on a website or into an email.
- 4
Check the before and after sizes, then download.
When you would use this
Compressing a picture is almost always about a limit somebody else set. An email that bounces at 10 MB. A portal that refuses anything over 2 MB per upload. A website that takes four seconds to load because the header photo came straight off a phone at twelve megapixels.
Resolution usually saves more than quality does.This is the part people get backwards. A 4000-pixel-wide photo displayed in a 800-pixel-wide column is carrying five times more detail than anything will ever show. Capping the width throws away data nobody can see; dropping the quality throws away data people can see. Try the width first and you will usually not need to touch the quality slider much at all.
Around seventy percent quality is where most images stop losing visibly and keep losing weight. Below fifty you start seeing blocky patches in skies, gradients and flat colour — the giveaway is smooth areas, not detailed ones. Photographs tolerate compression far better than screenshots or anything with text in it, because sharp edges are exactly what the format struggles with.
The output is JPEG, which has no transparency. A PNG with a transparent background is placed on white before encoding, since without that it would come out on black. If you need the transparency, this is the wrong tool — the format itself cannot carry it.
One thing worth saying plainly: this is lossy and it is not reversible. The detail is gone from the file you download, and compressing that result again compounds it. Always keep the original, and compress a copy — recompressing an already-compressed image is how pictures end up looking like they have been photocopied.
Questions
- What quality should I use?
- Start at 70%. Check the result at full size — if it looks fine, try lower. Smooth areas like skies show compression first, so judge it there rather than on detailed parts.
- Why is my PNG now a JPG?
- JPEG is what makes photos small. It has no transparency, so a transparent background is placed on white first. If you need transparency, use the convert tool and keep it as PNG.
- Should I reduce the width or the quality?
- Width, first. An image displayed at 800 pixels gains nothing from being 4000 wide, and removing that costs you nothing visible — unlike quality, which does.
- Can I get the original quality back?
- No. Compression is lossy and permanent in the downloaded file. Keep your original and always compress a copy.
- Are my photos uploaded?
- No. Compression happens in your browser using your own machine, so the picture never leaves your computer.
Related tools
Site photographs that need to survive longer than the email
Ofivio files photographs against the project, the stage and the person who took them, at full quality, so the record still means something a year later.
See Ofivio