PNG

A lossless raster format designed for graphics rather than photographs, with per-pixel transparency and no quality loss on re-save.

PNG filters each scanline to expose redundancy and then compresses with Deflate. Decoding returns the original pixels exactly, which makes it the safe choice for screenshots, logos and any artwork that will be edited repeatedly.

Representation

binary

Compression

Deflate, Adaptive filtering

Lossy

No

Transparency

Yes

Animation

No

Typical size

50 KB–5 MB depending on content

File signature

89 50 4E 47 0D 0A 1A 0A

Open specification

Yes

Introduced

1996

Organisation

W3C / PNG Development Group

1. 1995Work starts as a patent-free replacement for GIF
2. 1996PNG 1.0 released
3. 2003Published as ISO/IEC 15948
4. 2025PNG Third Edition adds HDR and official APNG support

• Windowsfull
• macOSfull
• Linuxfull
• Androidfull
• iOSfull

Browsers: Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge.

Applications: Photoshop, Figma, GIMP, Office, every browser.

• Perfectly lossless — safe to re-save indefinitely
• Full 8-bit alpha transparency
• Universal support with no licensing constraints

• Photographs are two to five times larger than JPEG
• No native animation in widely deployed decoders

• Logos and icons
• Screenshots
• UI mockups
• Images with transparency

• Use PNG-8 with a palette for flat-colour graphics to cut size sharply
• Run a lossless optimiser before publishing

Converting PNG to JPEG discards transparency and introduces artefacts; WebP lossless keeps both quality and alpha at a smaller size.

• PNG to JPG
• PNG to WEBP
• PNG to AVIF
• PNG to PDF
• PNG to ICO
• PNG to BMP
• PNG to TIFF

• Convert to WebP

  Lossless WebP keeps every pixel and the alpha channel while cutting file size by roughly a quarter compared with PNG.

  Trade-offs: Some older desktop applications still cannot open WebP.

  Learn about WebP

Every conclusion below is derived from the structured facts on this page — nothing is written by hand.

• Image quality100/100

  • Because it is lossless, so decoding returns the original pixels exactly.
  • Because it carries ICC colour profiles, so colours survive the round trip.

• Transparency100/100

  • Because it supports transparency.
  • Because it stores a full alpha channel, allowing soft edges and partial opacity.

• Browser compatibility100/100

  • Because every major browser engine renders it natively.
  • Because at least one shipping browser renders it.

• Operating system compatibility100/100

  • Because Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS all open it without extra software.
  • Because most platforms handle it natively.

• Software compatibility100/100

  • Because a broad range of applications read and write it.
  • Because several mainstream applications support it.

• Cloud compatibility100/100

  • Because an open specification means cloud SDKs can implement it without licensing friction.
  • Because it converts into many other formats, which suits automated pipelines.

• AI compatibility100/100

  • Because open specifications are implemented by the open-source decoders that ML stacks rely on.
  • Because lossless pixels avoid compression artefacts leaking into training data.
  • Because wide library support means common data loaders can read it.

• Long-term archiving100/100

  • Because the specification is public, so a decoder can always be rebuilt.
  • Because lossless storage preserves the original data for future migrations.
  • Because it is a current, actively maintained format.

• Professional editing100/100

  • Because lossless data survives repeated open-edit-save cycles without degrading.
  • Because colour profiles travel with the file, keeping the pipeline colour-managed.
  • Because professional applications read and write it.

• Metadata support100/100

  • Because it carries EXIF-style embedded metadata.
  • Because it embeds colour-profile metadata.

• Open standards100/100

  • Because the specification is published openly.
  • Because an official specification document is publicly reachable.

• Licensing100/100

  • Because an openly specified format can be implemented without a licence negotiation.
  • Because the core patents are old enough to have expired.

• Popularity100/100

  • Because it sits at the centre of the format ecosystem, with many documented relationships.
  • Because mainstream applications ship support for it.
  • Because every mainstream operating system handles it.

• Future-proofing88/100

  • Because it is actively maintained and current.
  • Because open specifications outlive the companies that create them.
  • Because nothing in the graph supersedes it yet.

• Printing suitability85/100

  • Because embedded ICC profiles keep colour predictable between screen and press.
  • Because lossless data means no compression artefacts appear at print resolution.

• Everyday consumer usage75/100

  • Because it opens by double-clicking on every mainstream device.
  • Because it is a current format that people and services still expect.

• Animation0/100

  • Because it is a single-frame format and cannot animate.

• Compression efficiency23/100

  • Because it stores data losslessly, so files stay large.
  • Because its codec generation predates modern entropy coding and block partitioning.

• PNG → WebP

  Animation improves by 100 points because it stores multiple frames, so animation is supported natively.

  Trade-off: Image quality drops by 67 points because it discards detail during encoding, and every re-save compounds the loss.

  Convert PNG to WebP