From photo to pixel art in two settings
Pixel art is defined by two limits: a low resolution and a small set of colors. This tool lets you set both and see the result live.
Pixels across (16 to 256) is the width of the art in “big pixels”. The height follows your image’s proportions, so a 3:2 photo at 64 across becomes 64 × 43. Low values, such as 24 or 32, look like early video game sprites; 128 or more keeps much more detail. The value cannot exceed the width of the original image.
Colors (2 to 64) is the size of the palette. Fewer colors give a bolder, more graphic look; 16 to 32 colors usually keep a photo recognizable. No dithering is applied: each block simply takes the nearest palette color, which gives flat, clean areas typical of hand-made pixel art.
Choosing a palette
| Palette | Colors | Look |
|---|---|---|
| From the image | 2–64, your choice | Colors picked from the photo itself (median cut) |
| Game Boy | 4 fixed greens | The green-screen look of the original 1989 handheld |
| PICO-8 | 16 fixed colors | The bright palette of the PICO-8 fantasy console |
| Grayscale | 2–64 shades, your choice | Evenly spaced grays from black to white |
“From the image” is the best default for portraits and landscapes. The retro palettes work well with simple subjects and strong contrast: a pet, a logo, a plant on a plain background. Pick the main colors of a photo as HEX codes with Color Palette from Image if you want to reuse them elsewhere.
Pixel grid and output size
Tick “Show pixel grid” to draw thin, semi-transparent lines between art pixels. It is useful as a guide for cross-stitch, perler beads, LEGO mosaics or re-drawing the art by hand in a sprite editor.
The download is always a PNG, which keeps the hard edges perfectly sharp — JPG would blur them. The art is scaled up by a whole number so it ends up close to 1024 pixels wide: 16 × at 64 across, 8 × at 128 across, 4 × at 256 across. The exact size is shown under the preview.
Pixel art vs. pixelate
The two are related but serve different goals. Pixelate Image breaks a photo into blocks while keeping its full range of colors, usually to hide a face or a license plate. This converter also limits the colors, which is what turns a blurry mosaic into something that looks like a drawing. For a flat-color effect without the blocks, try Posterize Image.
Tips for better results
- Crop close to the subject first; pixel art has few pixels to spare on background.
- Photos with clear lighting and strong shapes convert better than busy scenes.
- Try a low pixel count with few colors, then raise one setting at a time until the subject reads clearly.
Formats and privacy
You can open JPG, PNG, WebP, AVIF, GIF (first frame), BMP and SVG, plus iPhone HEIC photos, one image at a time. The conversion runs with your browser’s canvas on your device: no upload, it works offline once the page has loaded, and no metadata is copied into the PNG.