Three formats dominate the web. Each has a clear use case — and using the wrong one either inflates your file sizes or degrades your images.
JPG (JPEG)
Best for: Photos, gradients, anything with millions of subtle colour variations.
JPG uses lossy compression that works by grouping nearby pixels and averaging their colours. This is invisible in photos — your eye blends similar tones naturally. But it creates blocky artefacts around hard edges and text.
- Tiny file sizes for photos
- Universal support
- No transparency
- Quality degrades each time you re-save
- Bad for text, logos, and flat-colour graphics
PNG
Best for: Logos, icons, screenshots, graphics with transparency, anything with text.
PNG is lossless — every pixel is stored exactly. This makes PNG files larger than JPGs for photos, but perfect for graphics where precision matters. The killer feature is alpha transparency: pixels can be partially see-through, essential for logos on coloured backgrounds.
- Supports full transparency
- Perfect quality — no artefacts ever
- Much larger file size than JPG for photos
WEBP
Best for: Web images where you want the benefits of both JPG and PNG with smaller file sizes.
Google developed WEBP to replace both JPG and PNG for the web. It supports lossy and lossless modes, transparency, and animation — and is 25-35% smaller than JPG at the same visual quality.
- Smaller files than JPG and PNG
- Supports transparency like PNG
- All modern browsers support it
- Older software may not support it
Quick decision guide
| Use case | Best format |
|---|---|
| Photo for a website | WEBP or JPG |
| Logo or icon | SVG or PNG |
| Screenshot | PNG |
| Social media post | JPG (PNG for text-heavy) |
| Print design | TIFF or PDF |