Compress JPG
Reduce JPEG file size in one tap and see exactly how much you save.
Free · No watermark · Private — your image never leaves your browser
Cameras and export presets default to 90-95 percent quality. The visible gain above the mid-80s is almost nil, but the file cost is large — that gap is free savings.
Re-encoding strips metadata, which is normally what you want for privacy, but rotation is applied to the pixels first so portrait photos don't come back sideways.
Each quality setting is encoded and sized up front, so you can see precisely where the returns stop being worth the kilobytes for your particular photo.
How it works
JPEG is already a compressed format, which is why people assume there's nothing left to gain. In practice most JPEGs are saved far above the quality they need — camera firmware and export presets routinely default to 90 or 95 percent, well past the point of visible return. Dropping to the mid-80s typically halves the file with no perceptible difference. Drop your JPG in, compare the levels with their real file sizes, and download the balance you want. It's encoded on your device, so nothing is uploaded.
- 1Drop your JPG or JPEG in — drag, click to browse, or paste from the clipboard.
- 2Look at the compression levels and their file sizes; the mid-range is usually the sweet spot.
- 3Optionally switch the output to WebP for a noticeably smaller file at the same quality.
- 4Download your compressed JPEG.
What the JPEG quality number actually controls
It isn't a linear dial. JPEG splits the image into 8×8 pixel blocks and converts each to frequency data, then divides that by a quantisation table — the quality setting scales that table. High frequencies (fine detail, sharp edges) get coarser treatment than low frequencies (broad areas of colour), because human vision is far more forgiving of lost detail than lost overall tone. Which is why dropping from 95 to 85 costs you almost nothing visually but a great deal of file size: you're mostly discarding detail nobody was resolving anyway.
Where JPEG artefacts come from
Push the quality too low and you start seeing the 8×8 grid itself — blocking. Around high-contrast edges you get ringing, a faint halo of noise, because a hard edge needs high-frequency data to describe and that's the first thing discarded. This is also why JPEG is the wrong format for screenshots and text: an edge that a PNG stores perfectly becomes a smear of artefacts in a JPEG. If your image is mostly text or flat colour, convert it to PNG or WebP instead of compressing it further.
Every re-save costs you
Open a JPEG, save it, and it's re-quantised — even at 100 percent quality. Do that repeatedly and artefacts accumulate, softening detail and muddying edges. This is generation loss, and it's irreversible. Always compress from your original export rather than from a file you already compressed, and keep the original archived.
Frequently asked questions
What quality should I use for JPG?
For photographs, 75 to 85 percent is the practical sweet spot — substantial savings, no visible difference at normal viewing size. Go to 60-70 for thumbnails and images displayed small. Above 90 you're mostly paying kilobytes for detail nobody will see.
Why is my compressed JPG barely smaller?
It was probably already compressed hard. If a file came off the web rather than out of a camera, most of the redundancy is gone and there's little left to remove. Reducing the pixel dimensions, or converting to WebP, will do more than another quality pass.
Does compressing a JPG remove EXIF data?
Yes. Re-encoding drops the metadata block, including GPS coordinates, camera model and timestamps. That's usually a privacy win. Rotation is baked into the pixels before encoding, so orientation is preserved even though the EXIF tag is gone.
Should I use WebP instead of JPG?
For anything going on a website, yes — WebP is typically 25 to 35 percent smaller than JPEG at matching visual quality, and every current browser supports it. Stay with JPG when the destination is an older application, a print workflow or an upload form that rejects WebP.
Can I compress a JPG to a specific size, like under 200 KB?
Each level shows its resulting size, so pick the largest one that comes in under your limit. If even the smallest is too big, reduce the pixel dimensions — that lowers the ceiling far more effectively than quality alone.
Is my photo uploaded to a server?
No. The compression happens in your browser on your own device, so the photo never leaves it. Nothing is stored, logged or transmitted.