Have you ever tried resizing an image to make it larger but instead lost the image quality? When you try to enlarge an image, it can look blurry and unprofessional. A picture is made up of thousands of pixels, and when you increase its size, those pixels become visible. As a result, you see a dull and low-quality picture. In this article, we will show you how to resize images to make them larger without losing quality.

Why do Images Lose Quality When Enlarged?

A bitmap is the most commonly used image format on the web. All your JPEG and PNG files are Bitmap image files. A bitmap image is made up of thousands of pixels. If you zoom in, you can actually see those pixels as squares. Each of these pixels is mapped to a fixed location on the image, hence the name Bitmap. Most image editing software shrinks or enlarges these pixels to resize an image. This is why when you resize an image to a smaller size, there is no visible quality loss. Mainly because those pixels become even less visible. On the other hand, when you resize an image in WordPress to make it large, these enlarged pixels become more visible, making the image look blurry and pixelated. The solution is to compensate for each enlarged pixel to match the properties of its nearest pixel. This method is called Fractal Interpolation or simply Fractals. It produces a much better result when an image is enlarged using this technique. Let’s take a look at how to use the most common image editing software for your WordPress website to resize pictures.

Method 1: Using Free Software GIMP

GIMP is a free alternative to premium tools like Adobe Photoshop and Affinity Photo. It can also be used to enlarge images with minimum quality loss. However, we should warn you that the result will not be as good as Perfect Resize, which we’ll show you in method 3 below. First, you need to download and install the free software on your computer. It’s available for both Mac and Windows devices. After that, open the image you want to resize in Gimp and go to Image » Scale Image. Next, enter the width and height to set your desired dimensions. Now, choose Cubic as the Interpolation method under the ‘Quality’ section, and click on the ‘Scale’ button when you’re done. That’s all, you can now export the enlarged image in different formats, like PNGm JPEG, HTML, and more.

Method 2: Enlarge Images Using Irfanview

Irfanview is a compact photo editing program that’s also free to use. It is only available for Windows-based operating systems and provides a smarter way to resize images and make them larger. Simply open your image in Irfanview and go to Image » Resize/Resample. This will bring up the image resize popup window. First, you need to enter your desired image size in the ‘Set new size’ field by defining the width and height. After that, you need to select resample under the ‘Size method’ section. Choose the ‘Lanczos (slowest)’ option from the filter dropdown menu. Lastly, check the box next to ‘Apply Sharpen After Resample’ and click the OK button when you’re done. Irfanview will now resize the image, which you can then save to your computer. You might notice that free tools don’t do a very good job resizing an image to make it larger. However, by adjusting sharpness and image contrast, you can enlarge images and minimize the quality loss in the process. That said, you can also use a premium tool to make sure that the image remains sharp and clear when it’s enlarged.

Method 3: Enlarge Images Using a Premium Software

ON1 Resize AI, or Perfect Resize as it was previously known, is a software that allows you to resize your images smartly. Plus, it offers a complete suite of tools for image editing. It is available as standalone software as well as a plugin for Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom, Capture One, and Apple Photos. The software uses artificial intelligence to help keep your images in high resolution, even when their size increases or you want to zoom in on a particular area. The standalone ON1 Resize AL software is available for pre-order for $69.99. If you require more photo editing tools like NoNoise, Effects, Portrait AI, and HDR, then you can buy a bundle, which will cost $149.99. There’s also a package that includes all the tools and plugins offered by ON1 and Cloud Sync storage, which starts from $7.99 per month with 200GB storage ($89.99 billed annually). We hope that this article helped you learn how to resize images to make them larger without losing quality. You may also want to see our guide on WooCommerce made simple and how to choose the best web design software. If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook. Disclosure: Our content is reader-supported. This means if you click on some of our links, then we may earn a commission. See how WPBeginner is funded, why it matters, and how you can support us. Editorial Staff at WPBeginner is a team of WordPress experts led by Syed Balkhi. We have been creating WordPress tutorials since 2009, and WPBeginner has become the largest free WordPress resource site in the industry.

How to Resize an Image with Resizing.app?

Resizing.app is the best image resizer that you can use online to adjust images for any purpose. Just follow the three simple steps below to instantly resize your image: 1 — Upload your image. Pick a photo from your gallery. You can choose GIF, JPEG, BMP, PNG, HEIC, or TIFF image file and drag and drop it right from your desktop to the box above. 2 — Choose your settings. Once you’ve uploaded your photo, you can customize the image settings. Do you want it to be smaller or larger than the original dimensions? Just enter the size and format (JPEG, PNG, or WEBP) along with optimization settings before saving. 3 — Apply the changes. If you’re satisfied with the settings you’ve indicated, all you have to do is apply the changes. Hit the Save button and your image will automatically download to your device in seconds.

What are the most common reasons for image resizing?

Knowing how to manipulate digital images properly is an important tool for making your website stand out from the competition. Resizing images without losing their original quality is also a great way to make a good first impression on visitors, who are most often captivated by pictures above all else. Poorly resized images are obvious to the user, often appearing as blurred distortions of the real thing. Sloppy resizing can drive away your potential audience, diminishing your impact, or even causing you to lose visitors. Another important reason behind the need to properly resize images is page speed. Photos and images arriving straight from a camera are very high in resolution. This means that there are many pixels, each taking its sweet time to load on your web browser. Reducing the resolution of your images before uploading them to your site is key to ensuring a smooth browsing experience. In this sense, page speed, as well as picture quality, are both equally important factors that you should keep into consideration when designing your site. Fortunately, resizing image pixels is not very complicated. It is easy to learn how to resize images without losing quality and this guide will show you how to do just that.

Is it possible to resize an image without losing its quality?

Yes! In fact, it is pretty easy to do so. But first, you need to understand the basics behind how to resize image pixels. Bitmap is the most commonly used image type online. All JPEG and PNG files are also Bitmap files, which are made up thousands of tiny pixels. If you download a JPEG or PNG file, zoom in real close and you will see what I’m talking about. Thousands of tiny square pixels that have assigned colors and positions on an image, hence the name: Bitmap. Speaking of image types, there are various common image file formats commonly used online. JPEG is one of them. Used to optimized web pages, JPEG’s are convenient given their small file sizes and quick loading speeds. PNG is a step up from JPEG, offering improved quality but at the cost of increased file sizes and reduced page speed. Finally, GIF’s are popular due to the ease in which they can be animated while maintaining a small file size. Together, these are the three most common online image file formats. With powerful programs like Photoshop, different image types can be easily converted into other formats. Keep common sense in mind as converting from a low-resolution format to a high-resolution format will not necessarily improve the quality of your picture. Before we move on, it is important to understand that the term resizing is just a general term. When it comes to manipulating pixels there are actually two methods, resizing and resampling. Resizing is the most basic as it simply enlarges or decreases the size of the pixels to whatever scale is desired. Thus, its other name, scaling. Resampling is slightly more complicated. Resampling is a tool that changes the number of pixels in the image itself. This is the most appropriate tool for resizing images for the web since page speed is so important, especially if you are using original photographs straight from your camera. If you decide the use a program capable of resampling, you are asking the program to analyze the image to decide which pixels to throw away or which to add. So if you’re looking to reduce image size without losing quality your best tool is resampling. Now let’s examine a few of the most popular tools for resizing images online.

The 3 best applications for resizing images without losing quality

There is an abundance of software tools available online for resizing images without losing quality. However, they range in flexibility, output quality, user-friendliness, and price. For smaller resizing projects, you can easily get away with using one of the many free applications. But for larger or more complicated projects, paid applications like Adobe Photoshop to come highly recommended.

Adobe Photoshop’s Perfect Resize

Adobe Photoshop is the most popular premium photo editing software available. Used by professional photographers, editors, and web designers the world over, no image resize guide would be complete without it. While Photoshop is not a free tool, its offerings are well worth its relatively low cost. And while it can take some time to process the image resize pixels, Photoshop is still relatively easy to use despite its abundant offerings. The best Photoshop method to resize images without losing quality is through Perfect Resize. Perfect Resize automates the resampling process with extreme ease of use, giving you a perfect resized image with the same level of quality. To use Perfect Resize, first, open the resize image in the application. Then click File, Automate, and select Perfect Resize. This opens the Perfect Resize window where you can either choose from a selection of preset resizing templates or input your own dimensions. After making your choice, simply click File, Apply and you’re done.

Gimp

If you’re looking for free image resizing software, Gimp is one of the most popular choices. A free alternative to Adobe Photoshop, Gimp if useful for resizing images without losing quality. However, it should be noted that Gimp is limited in its application, and should be used only for modest resizing. To resize an image with Gimp, simply open your image in the application. Go to Image, then Scale, where you can input your desired dimensions. Finally, under the Quality, choose Sinc as Interpolation and then click Scale. There you have it, an image resize with sustained quality.

Irfanview

Irfanview is a remarkable multimedia tool capable of much more than simple image resizing. While only available for Windows operating systems, Irfanview is a practical and speedy tool, thanks to the exceptionally small amount of system resources it takes to resize a large image file. While Irfanview is convenient when used properly, its user interface is very dated and may be tricky to navigate for some new users. Finally, as freeware Irfanview is a wonderful application, but for those looking for professional ready image resizing, a more powerful program is necessary. To resize an image with Irfanview, first open your image in the application then select Image, Resize/Resample. The resize pop up window will appear, where you can then enter your desired dimensions in Set Image Size. Then select Resample and choose Lanczos (slowest). Finally, don’t forget to select the option ‘Apply Sharpen After Resample’ as this will give you the best results.

Resize for success

You should now have the confidence to begin resizing images for yourself. While freeware applications are wonderful tools, they might not be powerful enough to maintain the quality of your images for larger resizes. For more important projects or more ambitious image resizing, consider using a paid tool like Photoshop. Change the dimensions of your image as well as the file size in seconds.

How Does Image Resizer Work?

It is the fastest way to edit your photos for all types of projects. Easily resize images by pixel dimensions, scale by percentages, and maintain the aspect ratio of your images so you can save photos in high resolution. You can even batch resize multiple photos at once, simplifying the image resizing process. This way, you can resize your photos for everything from social media posts to printing your family photos, all without sacrificing image quality. Your photos can be adjusted to the dimensions and file size you need with our fast and free tool.

Resize Photos by Converting Pixels to Inches

Resizing photos for print means changing pixels to inches. Don’t worry, we’ve done the math for you, so resizing the dimensions of your photo is easy. The chart to the right lists the most common photo-print sizes, and their corresponding dimensions in pixels. You can use this table to resize photos. First, find the size you want your photo print to be, then adjust the pixels accordingly using our online tool before saving your resized photo to your Computer in high resolution. Now you’re ready for pain-free photo printing!

Size Matters. Resize Photos for Every Site.

Adjusting your photos for every online platform is tricky. With our free Image Resizer, you can resize photos for social media, Shopify, your website, and more! Resize photos for your online store or change the dimensions of your blogging graphics with ease. You can adjust the dimensions of your images, no matter where you’re posting the photos. Keep your Facebook cover photos current, adjust your YouTube thumbnails, or get the perfect Twitter header using a pixel-by-pixel ratio to adjust the exact dimensions you need while leaving the image resolution intact.

Printing Your Images? Resize Photos for Print.

Looking for the best way to resize your images for print? Our tool, located in the Photo Editor, makes fine-tuning the dimensions of your photos for print simple. You can resize your family portraits, change the dimensions for a t-shirt design, or create the perfect poster for your room.

Photo Resizing FAQ

How Do I Resize My Image Using BeFunky?

Upload your photo into the Photo Editor, navigate to the Edit section, and then select Resize. You can get an in-depth look at using the tool to resize your photos in this article!

What Photo File Types Can Be Resized Using the Resize Image Tool?

BeFunky supports JPEG/JPG (common file format for digital cameras), GIF, BMP, and PNG file formats. Here’s an article to learn more about what kinds of files can be uploaded to BeFunky.

What’s the Difference Between Resizing Your Image and Cropping Your Image?

Resizing is used to change the size of the entire image, and cropping is to ensure the image can fit a certain size constraint.

What is the Aspect Ratio of an Image?

The aspect ratio of an image displays the proportional relationship between a photo’s width and its height. It is most often shown as two numbers separated by a colon, as in 8:9. It is important to note in the process of resizing your image, you may want to lock the aspect ratio to ensure the quality of your photo stays the same. Here’s an article to learn more about this process.

How Do I Resize a Photo Without Losing Quality?

Upload your photo to the Photo Editor, then customize the image settings based on whether you’re making the image smaller or larger, and the format you’re saving in (JPG, PDF, or PNG). Once you’re satisfied with your resized photo, click Save.

Why is Image Resolution Important?

The image resolution is typically described in PPI, which refers to how many pixels are displayed per inch of an image. Higher resolutions mean that there are more pixels per inch (PPI), while lower resolutions have fewer PPI and can often appear stretched after the resizing process is complete.

How to Resize an Image in 4 Steps

Our Image Resizer never compromises quality

01. Select Resize

Choose Resize from the Edit section of BeFunky’s Photo Editor.

02. Adjust Image Size

Type in your new width and height dimensions.

03. Apply Changes

Click the checkmark and let the Image Resizer do its work.

04. Save your Photo

Save your resized image

Get Started with Our Free Online Image Resizer

• How to shade with colored pencils
• How to get the most out of your ring doorbell
• How to become a rhodes scholar
• How to carry a puppy
• How to walk by faith