Pixel art converter

Chunky pixels and a limited palette from any picture, previewed live and made on this device.

Nothing is uploaded
Works offline after first visit
Open source
No watermark · limit is your device’s memory; phones hold less

Turns any photo or drawing into pixel art, with a pixel width, colour count or retro palette, dithering and a grid. It is free, needs no account and adds no watermark, and your files are not uploaded: everything runs in your browser on your device. The size limit is your device’s memory, and phones hold less; give the page a short while after one visit to save itself for offline use, and then it works offline.

Drop pictures to pixelateor click to choose files. Batches welcome.

Pixels across 64

Colours

Save at

Dither (mix colours in a pattern) Draw grid lines

Working…

Done

Your files are processed on this device and never sent to a server. Reload the page to clear everything from memory.

How it works

Drop a photo, drawing or logo (JPG, PNG, WebP, HEIC or SVG).
Set how many pixels across and pick a palette; the preview updates as you go.
Press Make pixel art and download a crisp PNG, enlarged or at one pixel per block.

In your browser, not on a server

Your browser decodes the picture (libheif or the Squoosh decoders step in for HEIC, AVIF and JPEG XL) and shrinks it to the grid in halving steps, so each block is the average of the pixels it covers. The palette comes from gifenc’s (MIT) colour quantizer or a fixed retro set; each block snaps to the nearest colour, weighted the way the eye weighs red, green and blue, with optional Floyd–Steinberg dithering. The small image is then enlarged with smoothing off, so every block stays a crisp square, and saved as PNG.

Compared with upload-based tools: Online pixel art makers upload your photo, often cap the grid size or the number of colours unless you pay, and some add a watermark. Here the picture never leaves your device and every setting is free.

Verify it yourself. Give the page a short while after one visit to save itself for offline use, then turn off Wi-Fi or switch to airplane mode and run the tool again. Or open your browser's developer tools (F12, or Cmd-Option-I on a Mac), pick the Network tab, and watch it while you convert. The panel above does the same count for you.

Questions

How many pixels across should I use?

For a sprite or avatar, 32 to 64. For a recognisable portrait or landscape, 96 to 128. A face that is small in the photo turns into a few blocks, so crop close to it before converting.

What do the palettes do?

The picture’s own colours pick the 8 to 64 shades that represent it best, which keeps it natural. Game Boy maps everything to four greens, PICO-8 to the fantasy console’s 16 fixed colours, and the grey and black-and-white sets suit prints and stamps. Dithering mixes neighbouring colours in a checker pattern to fake shades the palette lacks.

Why is the result a PNG?

Pixel art is flat blocks of exact colour. JPG blurs those edges and adds speckles, while PNG keeps every block sharp and is small for this kind of image. Transparent areas in the source stay transparent.

Can I use it as a pattern for beads or cross-stitch?

Yes. Turn on grid lines and save enlarged: each square is one bead or stitch. Pick a small palette so you need few thread or bead colours, and set pixels across to your pegboard or fabric width, for example 29 for a small Perler board.

Is my picture uploaded?

No. The picture is shrunk, recoloured and enlarged on a canvas in your browser tab, and the PNG is saved from there. Your files are not uploaded, and it works offline after one visit and a short wait.

Pixel art converter

Done

How it works

In your browser, not on a server

Questions

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