Same picture. Two containers. One is often half the bytes. The other is the file your uncle’s email client already understands.
The short answer
- WebP — usually smaller at the same look. Good for websites, Discord, modern browsers, and your own archive.
- JPEG — the boring send. Email, older phones, printers, listing sites that still say “JPG only.”
If you are not sure the other person can open WebP, send JPEG.
Why WebP is smaller
JPEG is old and good at photos. WebP is newer and better at the same job for a lot of camera pictures. At a similar visual quality, WebP often lands 25–40% smaller. Sometimes more on simple scenes. Sometimes the gap is tiny on a noisy night shot.
PNG is the wrong tool for a camera photo. It is lossless. A 12-megapixel PNG can be enormous. Convert it to JPEG or WebP unless you need a hard-edged graphic with a transparent background.
HEIC is what iPhones write. It is already compact. The problem is compatibility. Re-saving as JPEG is how you send it to someone who does not live in Apple Photos. That job, without a resize: HEIC to JPG.
Try both on one file
The image compressor can write either format from the same drop. Compress once as JPEG, once as WebP, compare the sizes. Keep the one that still looks fine.
Only changing the box, original pixels: JPG to WebP or WebP to JPG. Need the holes kept? WebP to PNG. Other pairs: convert images.
A useful default:
- Long edge 1920
- Quality around 76
- WebP if you control the destination
- JPEG if you do not
Need a hard cap for an upload form? Use the size cap and stay on JPEG unless the form accepts WebP.
What does not change
Neither format keeps EXIF when this tool re-encodes. The smaller file is also the washed file. Details: does compressing a photo remove GPS. How to shrink without giving the original to a random site: compress images without uploading.