Crop before you compress
Empty background costs bytes. Cropping tight on the subject leaves more of the size budget for the detail that matters.
Resize an image to 1 MB
1 MB is the everyday cap for email attachments, CMS uploads and job-application portals. Drop your photo in below — the target is already set to 1 MB, and everything runs inside this browser tab, so the image never leaves your device.
How to get a photo under 1 MB without it turning to mush
Match the required dimensions
Most forms cap both KB and pixels. Set the dimension preset here as well so a 1 MB file is not rejected for being the wrong shape.
Use JPG for photos
PNG stores photos far less efficiently. Choosing JPG output often reaches the target with visibly better quality.
Who asks for 1 MB?
1 MB is the default attachment ceiling on job-application portals, CMS media libraries and many internal document systems.
Settings that actually reach 1 MB
At 1 MB you rarely need to reduce dimensions at all — quality alone gets a typical 12 MP phone photo under the limit while staying visually identical.
The mistake that gets uploads rejected
Assuming the file is already small because the phone shows it as 'optimised'. Phone galleries display a preview; the stored original is usually several megabytes.
Questions about 1 MB uploads
- Why is my phone photo 6 MB in the first place?
- Modern sensors capture 12–50 megapixels at high quality settings. Almost all of that detail is invisible once the image is viewed on a screen or printed at document size.
- Does this change the aspect ratio?
- No, unless you explicitly set dimensions that require it. Proportions are preserved by default.
Other size targets
Resize to 10 KBResize to 15 KBResize to 20 KBResize to 25 KBResize to 30 KBResize to 40 KBResize to 50 KBResize to 60 KBResize to 80 KBResize to 100 KBResize to 150 KBResize to 200 KBResize to 300 KBResize to 500 KBResize to 1000 KBResize to 2 MBResize to 18 KBResize to 70 KBResize to 5 MBResize to 10 MBCustom targetSignature resizer