JPG vs PNG vs WebP vs AVIF: Which Image Format Should You Use?

The short answer

Use JPG for compatibility, PNG for transparency and crisp graphics, WebP for modern websites, and AVIF when maximum compression matters and your audience uses newer browsers.

Format comparison

JPG is best for photos and legacy systems. It is lossy, widely supported, and usually small enough for email and CMS uploads.

PNG is best for transparent backgrounds, UI screenshots, charts, and images with sharp text. It is often much larger than JPG for photos.

WebP supports both lossy and lossless compression, plus transparency. It is a strong default for web pages because it usually beats JPG and PNG on file size.

AVIF can produce excellent compression, especially for large photographs, but encoding may be slower and older tools may not support it.

Practical choices

For a blog hero image, export WebP and keep a JPG fallback if your publishing system needs it. For a transparent logo, use PNG or WebP. For screenshots with small labels, test PNG and WebP before using JPG. For high-volume image galleries, compare WebP and AVIF at the same visual size.

Quality settings

Quality numbers are not identical across formats. JPG quality 80 and WebP quality 80 do not mean the same internal compression. Always compare output visually and by file size instead of trusting the number alone.

Privacy and workflow

When converting client or unpublished images, prefer a local browser converter. It lets you test formats quickly without sending original files to a server.