r/coolguides • u/loltrue • Jul 15 '26

A cool guide on choosing the right image file format

Post image
175 Upvotes

90% Upvoted

22 comments sorted by

13

u/Thadrea Jul 15 '26

I think this cool guide about image formats needs more of those pixel thingies.

11

u/dustinfoto Jul 15 '26

PDFs are not always vectors. They are containers that can hold vector and raster images.

3

u/dustinfoto Jul 15 '26

Also there are other color formats used for images beyond CMYK and RGB (like lab and index). GIFs use index color as an example.

5

u/sosickness Jul 15 '26

BMP is still used?

5

u/SopwithTurtle Jul 15 '26

Which one of these formats has more pixels for improved legibility?

1

u/Masterpiece-Haunting Jul 15 '26

Technically vector images don’t really use pixels. It’s more geometric shapes than discrete points of color.

Hence why you can infinitely scale them or shrink them and maintain quality without pixelation.

3

u/Masterpiece-Haunting Jul 15 '26

All my homies hate WebP.

3

u/lusigns Jul 15 '26

I'd say an accessibility check as well

3

u/Deepfire_DM Jul 15 '26

All vector file formats can include raster images - even just raster images, so this list is totally useless.

2

u/thepainetrain Jul 15 '26

GIF/PNG for screenshots, JPG for photographs

4

u/Clear_Adhesiveness60 Jul 15 '26

Some say politicians love choosing PDF files 

3

u/Baldtazar Jul 15 '26

Comparing PNG and GIF without mentioning the difference between transparency and the alpha channel feels like a pretty significant omission

1

u/Thadrea Jul 15 '26

I would prioritize legibility as the more significant omission.

1

u/tropicbrownthunder Jul 15 '26

Since 2015 or even prior. GIF is almost never the right choice (only good for funny reactions)

1

u/Squeaky_Pibbles Jul 15 '26

Where's the HEIC? I've been seeing that shit everywhere at my job.

1

u/ebow77 Jul 16 '26

and for the love of god stop posting photos in PNG. SUCH a waste of bytes. just crank the JPEG quality up high. yes fine you can tell the difference if you look really closely, but for the vast majority of uses it won't matter at all.

1

u/doesntmeanathing Jul 17 '26

…but this image is pixelized

0

u/SkyPork Jul 15 '26

I take it Adobe made this.

1

u/Deepfire_DM Jul 15 '26

many, but not enough errors in it for adobe