HEIC to PNG
Convert HEIC images to PNG right in your browser. HEIC is the format iPhones save photos in, which many apps and Windows PCs can't open - this makes the photo usable anywhere. PNG is lossless and keeps transparency, ideal for graphics and screenshots.
- Free, no watermarks
- Files deleted after 1 hour
- Runs in your browser
- No account needed
Why use SnapFetch
- Turns HEIC files into standard PNG images in one click
- Runs server-side with no quality tricks - no watermark, no signup
- Your image is deleted from our servers after 1 hour
How it works
- 1
Choose or drag in a HEIC image
- 2
We convert it to PNG
- 3
Download your PNG image
- 4
Files are deleted from our servers after 1 hour
When to use HEIC to PNG
HEIC is the format iPhones save photos in by default. It stores the same picture in roughly half the space of a JPG, which is great on the phone and a problem everywhere else - Windows, older web forms and plenty of apps simply will not open it. Converting to PNG makes the photo usable anywhere. Be deliberate about this one. If you only want to share the photo, JPG is the better answer - a lossless encode of a photograph is typically several times larger than the HEIC, and it cannot make the picture any better than the phone already saved it. PNG earns its place when the image is going into editing where you do not want repeated re-compression, or into software that will only accept PNG. PNG is lossless, so it will not add any further compression - but it cannot undo what the source already lost either, and the file will usually come out larger than what you put in. Work from the original in your camera roll rather than a copy that has already been through a messaging app, since those re-compress the photo on the way.
Specifications & limits
- Accepted input
- HEIC and HEIF (.heic, .heif)
- Output format
- PNG (lossless)
- Compression on input
- HEIC is already lossy - some detail was discarded before upload
- Transparency
- Not applicable - HEIC has no alpha channel, so there is no transparency to carry over
- Maximum dimensions
- 8000 x 8000 pixels
- Maximum file size
- 20 MB per upload
- File retention
- Deleted from our servers 1 hour after upload
Troubleshooting
The background is white and I wanted it transparent
A HEIC cannot store transparency in the first place, so there is none to carry across - the white was already part of the picture. To get a transparent background you need Remove Background, not a format conversion.
The PNG is no sharper than the HEIC
Expected. PNG is lossless, so it preserves exactly what it is handed - it cannot restore detail the HEIC discarded earlier. Converting is worth it for editing headroom or for software that will not read HEIC, not for image quality.
The file is rejected
Only .heic and .heif files are accepted here. A photo already exported as JPG should use a different converter.
The upload is rejected before anything happens
The file is over the 20 MB cap. Compress it first, or split a long PDF into smaller files and process them separately.
References
The published specification for the formats involved, and the open-source software that actually performs this conversion.
- Apple - HEIF and HEVC media formats
Apple's own explanation of why iPhones save photos as HEIC.
- PNG specification (W3C)
The PNG standard, covering lossless compression and the alpha channel.
- Pillow documentation
The imaging library used for our image conversion, resizing and compression.
Frequently asked questions
PNG is lossless, so this step adds no further loss. It cannot recover detail the HEIC had already discarded, though, and the output is usually larger than the file you started with - that is the trade for keeping every remaining pixel exactly.
From the blog
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