Free Online JPG to PNG Converter
Your photo is decoded and edited in this tab. It stays local, including whatever its metadata says about where it was taken.
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How it works
The asymmetry: one direction loses, the other cannot restore
JPEG is lossy. It transforms 8×8 blocks with a DCT, quantises the coefficients and throws the remainder away permanently. PNG is lossless — filtering plus deflate over the exact pixel values, with no quantisation anywhere. So PNG to JPG discards detail, and JPG to PNG does not bring it back: it faithfully preserves whatever the JPEG decoder produced, ringing artefacts and all, in a file that is usually several times larger. The only thing that direction actually gains you is an alpha channel and a lossless base to edit from.
- PNG colour type
- 8-bit truecolour with alpha for photographs and anything with transparency; an indexed palette is smaller for flat-colour graphics with few distinct colours.
- Alpha channel
- PNG has one, JPEG has none. Going to JPG, transparent pixels are composited onto a matte colour rather than dropped.
- JPEG quality
- Applies only in the PNG to JPG direction. 85 or above is sensible when the source is a lossless original you cannot recover.
- File size
- A photograph as PNG typically runs five to ten times the JPEG. That is the format working correctly, not a conversion fault.
- Metadata
- Re-encoding writes a clean file. JPEG EXIF blocks and PNG tEXt chunks from the source are not carried across.
How to use it
How to convert JPG to PNG online
- 01
Drop in a JPG or PNG
The direction follows from what you dropped in.
- 02
Set quality or matte colour
Quality matters going to JPG; the matte colour matters when the PNG has transparency.
- 03
Download the converted copy
The source file on your disk is untouched.
Where it earns its keep
Where each direction is the right call
- Turning a photo into a PNG so it can be edited without stacking another lossy generation.
- Flattening a transparent logo onto white for a system that only takes JPEG.
- Getting a screenshot out of JPEG, where its text has gone soft, into a lossless format.
- Cutting the size of a PNG photograph that has no transparency to justify it.
Questions
JPG ↔ PNG, answered
Does converting JPG to PNG improve the image?
No. This is the most common misunderstanding about the format. PNG stores the decoded JPEG pixels exactly — including its compression artefacts — in a much larger file. It gives you a lossless base for further edits, not a better picture.
Are my images sent anywhere to convert?
No. Both directions decode and re-encode in this browser tab, so the file never leaves your device and the tool works offline.
Which should I use for a screenshot?
PNG. Screenshots are flat colour and sharp text, exactly what JPEG's DCT handles worst — you get visible ringing around every letter. PNG keeps text crisp and is often the smaller file for that kind of image anyway.
Why is my converted PNG so much bigger?
Because PNG cannot throw anything away. Lossless compression works on runs and patterns, and photographic noise has neither, so the file reflects the real information content of the image rather than a quantised approximation of it.