Compress an image to 500 KB

A generous ceiling. Most photos reach it with quality losses you would need to go looking for.

Drop an image here, or click to choose one

You can also paste a screenshot with Ctrl+V. JPG, PNG, WebP.

Target file size

Or an exact size (KB)

Output format

Network measuring… Your file never leaves this device

Every byte of that work happened on your own machine. Verify it: open DevTools → Network, and use the tool. No request carries your image, because none is made.

Compression you will not see

Five hundred kilobytes is enough that the exercise becomes almost invisible. A full-resolution phone photograph at 500 KB typically encodes around quality 85 to 90, which is above the threshold at which JPEG artefacts become perceptible on ordinary viewing. You are throwing away perhaps 85% of the original file and keeping essentially all of the apparent image.

Why such a large original in the first place

Modern phones write enormous files because they are optimised for editing headroom, not for delivery. A 12-megapixel sensor at high quality settings produces four to six megabytes; a 48-megapixel one can pass twenty. Almost none of that survives being viewed on a screen, resized for a web page, or printed at anything smaller than poster size. Compressing to 500 KB is not degrading the photo so much as declining to carry data nobody will ever see.

Email, which is where this limit usually comes from

Many mail systems still choke on large attachments, and a great many corporate ones silently strip or bounce messages above a total size. Compressing a set of photographs to 500 KB each means you can attach eight or ten of them and stay inside almost any limit — and the recipient will not be able to tell the difference on their screen.

Other targets

Compress to 20 KBThe tightest limit you are likely to meet. The tool shrinks dimensions rather than destroying quality, so the result stays readable.Compress to 50 KBTight, but workable. At 50 KB a properly cropped portrait still looks like a proper photograph.Compress to 100 KBThe web's most common ceiling Compress to 200 KBRoom to keep real detail. At 200 KB you can hold document scans and text legibly, not just faces.Compress to 1 MBThe gentlest common limit. Usually a matter of trimming excess rather than making sacrifices.Resize to exact pixelsSet width and height directly

Questions about 500 KB

Can I still print a 500 KB photo?

For a standard 6 × 4 print, comfortably. Print quality depends on pixel dimensions rather than file size, and the tool only reduces dimensions when quality alone cannot reach the target — which at 500 KB it almost never needs to. Check the pixel figure shown under the result: anything above about 1800 × 1200 prints well at 6 × 4.

How many photos can I compress at once?

One at a time in this tool. Batch processing is genuinely useful and worth adding, but doing it properly means handling memory carefully — decoding twenty full-resolution photos at once will exhaust a phone's memory and crash the tab, which is a worse experience than doing them singly.

Is WebP worth it at this size?

Yes, if the destination accepts it. WebP at 500 KB carries roughly the quality JPEG needs 650-700 KB for. For email and websites it is a straightforward win; for upload forms, check what they accept first.