Remove an image background
Cut the background out of a photo and get a transparent PNG — without the picture ever leaving your computer.
Free · No sign-up · Your file never leaves your computer
No file handy? — generated here, not downloaded.
Uses U²-Net, released under the Apache License 2.0, running in your browser via ONNX Runtime Web.
How to use it
- 1
Choose a photo. A clear subject against a distinct background works best.
- 2
Pick transparent for logos and overlays, or white for a product listing or an ID photo.
- 3
Press remove. The first run downloads about 18 MB of model and runtime, once — after that it is quick and works offline.
- 4
Download the PNG.
When you would use this
Cutting a subject out of its background is one of those jobs that is trivial to describe and tedious to do by hand. A product needs to sit on white for a listing. A portrait needs to go on a coloured panel. A logo photographed off a sign needs to become a graphic.
The difference here is where it happens. Every popular tool for this uploads your photograph to a server, processes it there and sends back a result — which means a copy of your image exists on somebody else's machine, subject to their retention policy. This one runs the model inside your browser. The photo is never transmitted, and we could not retrieve it if we were asked to. For a passport photo, a staff portrait or a product not yet announced, that is not a small distinction.
The cost is the first run, and it is not trivial: roughly 18 MB of model and runtime has to reach your browser before anything can happen, because the work is being done on your machine rather than ours. It is downloaded once and cached, so the second photo is quick and works with no connection at all. Nothing else on this site needs that, and on a slow or metered connection it is a fair reason to use something else — we would rather say so than let you find out.
Transparent or white is a real choice, not a preference. Transparent is what you want for anything that will sit on top of something else — a logo, an overlay, a slide. White is what marketplaces and passport offices actually require, and a transparent PNG sent to one of those will be rejected or will render on black.
It is good, not magic. A clear subject against a contrasting background comes out cleanly. Fine hair, fur, motion blur, glass and anything the same colour as what is behind it are where every automatic cutout struggles, and this one is a little softer on those than the paid services — they use models we cannot licence for a free tool. For a difficult image, expect to tidy the edge in an image editor afterwards.
The result is always a PNG. JPEG has no alpha channel, so a transparent cutout saved as JPEG comes back with a black background — which is why tools that let you choose JPEG here are quietly giving you a broken file.
Questions
- Is my photo uploaded?
- No. The model runs inside your browser on your own machine, so the picture is never sent to us or to anyone else. That is the main reason to use this rather than one of the server-based tools.
- Why is the first time slow?
- About 18 MB of model and runtime downloads once, because the work happens on your machine instead of on a server. Your browser caches it, so every run after that is quick and works with no connection. On a metered connection, that first load is a real cost worth knowing about.
- Transparent or white?
- Transparent for anything that sits on top of something else — logos, overlays, slides. White for marketplace listings and ID photos, which usually require it and will reject a transparent PNG.
- Why is the edge rough on hair?
- Fine hair, fur and glass are where every automatic cutout struggles. The models that handle them best are licensed for non-commercial use only, so a free tool cannot ship them. Tidy the edge in an image editor for a difficult photo.
- Can I get a JPG instead?
- Not for a transparent result — JPEG cannot store transparency and would give you a black background. Choose white and convert it afterwards if you specifically need a JPG.
- Does it work on a phone?
- Yes, though a large photo on an older phone will be slow. Resize the image first if it stalls.
Related tools
Cutting out the same product photo for the fifth listing
Ofivio keeps every product and project image on the record it belongs to, at full quality, so the version you need is found rather than remade.
See Ofivio