JPG vs PNG vs WebP: Which Format Should You Use?
Guide · Image formats explained
Three formats cover almost every image you will ever handle, and they make opposite trade-offs. Choosing the right one is the single biggest file-size decision you make — bigger than any quality slider. Here is how each format thinks, what the same picture weighs in each, and a simple rule for picking.
The one idea underneath all three
Every image format is a way of writing down pixels. They differ in how much they are allowed to throw away. PNG is lossless: it stores the picture exactly, pixel for pixel, and squeezes only the repetition. JPG is lossy: it permanently discards detail your eyes are least likely to miss, which is why it can reach tiny sizes. WebP can be either: it has a lossy mode that competes with JPG and a lossless mode that competes with PNG, and in Google's published comparisons it beats both — lossy WebP files average about 25–34% smaller than equivalent JPGs, and lossless WebP about 26% smaller than PNGs. Format choice is really a decision about what may be discarded.
The same photo, three formats
Take a typical 12-megapixel phone photo (4000 × 3000 pixels) and save it three ways at good screen quality. The PNG comes out around 15–25 MB — every leaf and wrinkle stored exactly. The JPG at 85% quality lands around 1.5–3 MB, visually near-identical on a screen. The WebP at a matching quality is usually 1–2 MB. Now take the opposite subject: a screenshot full of text and flat colours. Here PNG shines — crisp edges and a modest file, because flat areas are exactly what lossless storage squeezes well. The same screenshot as a JPG grows fuzzy halos around every letter, and its WebP sits in between: clean if saved losslessly, smaller if you accept slight softness. Subject first, format second.
Where each format wins
- JPG — photographs everywhere: forms, email, sharing, printing at normal sizes. No transparency. Supported by literally everything, including older government portals that reject anything newer.
- PNG — screenshots, logos, diagrams, text in images, and anything needing a transparent background. Files are large for photos because nothing is discarded.
- WebP — websites and modern apps, where its smaller size at equal quality loads pages faster. Supports transparency and both lossy and lossless modes. The catch is compatibility: some older software and a few official upload systems still refuse it.
Transparency, animation and other deciders
If the image needs a see-through background — a logo over a coloured page, a product cut-out — JPG is out immediately, because it has no transparency at all; choose PNG for maximum compatibility or WebP for size. For simple animations, WebP (and its cousin AVIF) has largely taken over from the heavy old GIF. And for anything archival — the master copy of a scan or artwork you may re-edit for years — keep a PNG (or the original file) untouched, and make JPG or WebP copies for everyday use. Editing a lossy file again and again slowly erodes it, each save discarding a little more; our guide to compressing without losing visible quality explains how to avoid that trap.
The simple rule
Photo for a screen or a form? JPG, unless the site happily accepts WebP and you want the smallest file. Graphic, screenshot or transparency? PNG, or lossless WebP if size matters. Uploading to an official portal? JPG — it is the one format no system argues with. And whenever a file arrives in the "wrong" format, you do not need new software: our Image Converter switches between JPG, PNG and WebP in your browser, and the Compress Image tool lets you compare the resulting sizes before you commit. Thirty seconds of choosing beats megabytes of habit.