Convert WebP to JPG

Where WebP still gets turned away

Browsers have shown WebP for years, but a lot of what sits around them has not caught up. Many upload forms, from job applications to photo printing, list JPG and PNG and nothing else. Older photo editors and office programs may refuse a .webp, or show it as a file they do not know.

JPG is the safe answer for photos in all of those places. It opens on every computer, phone and website, and it keeps the file small enough for email attachments and upload limits, where a PNG of the same photo could be several times bigger.

The exception is a picture with a see-through background, such as a logo or a cut-out product. JPG cannot keep that, so either let it go onto a color (see below) or keep the transparency with WebP to PNG.

Outside the browser, a JPG also behaves like any other photo: it drops into documents and slides, shows a thumbnail in File Explorer, and attaches to any message without a second thought.

Choosing a quality

JPG and lossy WebP both save space by leaving out detail the eye is least likely to miss. Converting one into the other means that happens twice, so it pays to keep the JPG's quality reasonably high:

• 88, where the slider starts, suits most photos: hard to tell from the WebP, at a sensible size.
• 90 to 95 for pictures with fine text, sharp lines or smooth skies, where blocky patches show first.
• 70 to 80 when the file has to be small and will be seen small, like a profile picture.

Going above 95 makes the file much bigger for very little you can see. Export works out the size from a smaller copy, so it is a close estimate; the Convert tool described below shows the exact figure.

If you tidy the picture up first, say a crop or Image › Auto tone and color, those changes go into the JPG too, drawn from the full-size WebP, so no sharpness is lost along the way.

Hitting a file size limit

If a form says “under 1 MB” or “at most 2 MB”, the size in pixels usually matters more than the quality. Pictures saved from websites are sometimes much larger than the page showed them, and no form needs all of those pixels.

The Size list in Export offers the full size and, when the picture is wider, 3840, 2560, 2048, 1920, 1600, 1280, 1080, 800 and 512 pixels wide. The height follows, so nothing is stretched. Try 1920 first, then 1280, and watch the KB figure drop. Lower the quality only after that. Width works so well because the pixel count falls with its square: half the width leaves a quarter of the pixels to store.

For more control over both, Octoolo also has an image resizer that takes exact pixel sizes, and an image compressor for squeezing files further.

WebPs with a see-through background

Logos, stickers and product cut-outs are often WebPs with transparent parts. JPG cannot store transparency, so those parts need a color. In Export, See-through parts become sets it: white at first, or any color from the color well, for example the color of the page the picture will sit on. Soft edges blend into that color the way they would over it.

The Convert tool in File › Many pictures at once… does the same with white. Its Quality runs from 10 to 100 and starts at 85, and the result is shown next to the original with both exact file sizes. Press Save JPG when it looks right.

If the clear background has to stay clear, a JPG is the wrong file: save a PNG instead.