Pixelate image online.
The whole photo, or just the part you box.
Drop in a photo or screenshot and it turns into blocks straight away. Switch to Areas I draw to pixelate only a face, a name or a licence plate. It all runs in your browser, so nothing is uploaded.
To pixelate image files, open one in the tool above: the whole picture turns into blocks at once and the Block size slider sets how coarse they are. To pixelate only part of it, choose Areas I draw and drag a box over each face, name or plate. It is free and runs in your browser. Pixelation stops casual viewers but can sometimes be undone, so black out passwords and account numbers instead.
What pixelating a picture does
To pixelate image files is to replace each square group of pixels with one flat block in the average colour of that group, so fine detail disappears while overall shapes and colours stay. The block size decides how much survives: at a few pixels a face is still a face, at a tenth of the picture’s width it is a handful of coloured squares.
People do it for two quite different reasons. One is to hide something before sharing: faces of people who did not agree to be posted, licence plates, house numbers, names and avatars in a screenshot, a spoiler. The other is the look itself: a pixel-art version of a photo for a profile picture or a post, a retro-game style, or a teaser that shows colours without showing the subject. The image pixelator above handles both, which is why it starts on the whole image and lets you switch to boxes.
Whole photo, selected areas, or a black box?
Pick by what the result is for. Style and teasers use the whole image; hiding uses boxes; secrets need something pixelation cannot give.
- ·Whole imageis for pixel art, avatars, a retro look and launch teasers. It is a mosaic of the photo’s own colours, not a converter to a fixed game palette; for sprite work, finish it in a pixel editor such as Aseprite or Piskel.
- ·Areas I draw pixelates faces, plates, names, avatars and spoilers and leaves everything else sharp. Use blocks large enough that what you hide is only a few blocks across. For text in screenshots, the blur text tool also offers a softer blur.
- ·Black box (in Areas I draw) replaces the pixels with solid black. Use it for passwords, card and account numbers, ID numbers and anyone who must not be identified. Pixelated text in a known font has been reconstructed, and software has recognised pixelated faces; a black box leaves nothing to reconstruct.
Three pictures, three reasons to pixelate
One for the look, one to protect other people, one to build suspense. Each was made with the tool above.
Before
AfterA night-time street photo turned into pixel art
For a post, a profile banner or a retro-game look, use Whole image and a small block size. At 15 px blocks this 760-pixel-wide photo becomes about 50 blocks across: the lit window, the lamp and the sign still read as shapes, but every fine detail is gone. Larger blocks push it further toward an 8-bit look; the colours stay the photo's own.
Before
AfterTeammates' faces and names in a screenshot you're posting
You want to show how your team uses an inbox tool in a public write-up, but the people in it didn't sign up to be in your blog post. Switch to Areas I draw and box each avatar and each name, then leave the subject lines readable, because they are the point of the screenshot. Don't forget the signed-in user at the bottom of the sidebar.
Before
AfterA launch teaser that shows the colours, not the product
A week before a product launch, post the hero shot with very large blocks so followers can guess. At this size the bottles become a few squares of gold and cream: the mood and palette come through, and the product and its name do not. On launch day, post the original next to it.
How to pixelate a photo in three steps
- Drop a photo or screenshot into the tool above, or tap to pick one from your phone. PNG, JPEG, WebP and HEIC all open.
- Keep Whole image for an all-over pixel effect, or choose Areas I draw and drag a box over each part to hide. Move the Block size slider until it looks right; it shows the block size in pixels.
- Zoom in to check the result, then download. A JPEG comes back as a JPEG, anything else as a PNG, at the same size; only photos over 16 megapixels are reduced first so the browser can handle them.
This is the wrong tool when you want something gone rather than hidden. Pixelated squares draw the eye; on a product photo, a slide or a meme where the words should simply not be there, removing the text and rebuilding the background looks better.
Frequently asked questions
How do I pixelate an image?+
Open the image in the tool at the top of this page. With Whole image selected, the picture turns into blocks straight away, and the Block size slider sets how coarse they are, from a few pixels to about a twelfth of the short side. Click Download to save it. It is free, needs no account and runs in your browser, so the image is not uploaded.
How do I pixelate part of an image?+
Choose Areas I draw, then drag a box over each part you want to hide: a face, a licence plate, a name, a house number. Everything outside the boxes stays sharp. Draw each box a little larger than what it covers, set the block size, check the result zoomed in and download. Undo removes the last box.
How do I turn a photo into pixel art?+
Use Whole image and move the Block size slider until the picture has as many blocks across as you want; smaller blocks keep more of the shape, larger ones look more like an old game. This is a mosaic filter: it keeps the photo's own colours and does not reduce them to a fixed palette or add outlines. For sprite-style art with a limited palette, take the result into a pixel editor such as Aseprite or Piskel and clean it up by hand.
Can a pixelated image be unpixelated?+
The original detail cannot be restored, but what was hidden can sometimes be worked out. Each block is the average of the pixels under it, so short, predictable text in a known font can be matched by rendering guesses; the open-source tool Depix recovered passwords from pixelated screenshots that way. Researchers also showed in 2016 that neural networks could recognise faces hidden by pixelation. AI upscalers that claim to unpixelate a photo invent plausible detail rather than recover the real one.
How do I pixelate a face in a photo so it can't be recognised?+
Box the whole head, including the hair and ears, and use large blocks, so the face is only a few blocks across. Small blocks leave enough of the structure for software to work with. If the person must not be identifiable at all, for example a child or someone at risk, cover the face with a solid black box or crop it out, and check the rest of the photo for a name tag, a reflection or a distinctive tattoo.
Is my image uploaded when I pixelate it here?+
No. The effect is drawn on a canvas in your browser and the download is made from that canvas, so the image never leaves your device, there is no sign-in and no copy is kept anywhere. Because the download is a new file, camera details stored in the original photo, such as GPS location, are not carried over.
Can I pixelate a picture on my iPhone or Android phone?+
Yes. Open this page in Safari or Chrome, tap the upload area and pick the photo; HEIC photos from an iPhone open too. In Areas I draw, drag boxes with your finger. Tap Download: on an iPhone the file goes to Downloads in the Files app, and Share then Save Image puts it in Photos.
What block size should I use?+
For pixel art, pick by how many blocks across you want: about 50 keeps a scene recognisable, about 15 to 20 looks like an early console game. For hiding something, think about the size of what you are hiding rather than the photo: a face or a line of text should end up only a few blocks wide. The slider shows the block size in pixels of your image.
“Is pixelating a face enough to make someone unrecognisable in a photo?”
Blur, pixelate or black out emails, phone numbers and messages, with advice on which one each kind of text needs.
When a pixelated patch would look wrong, paint over a caption or label and the background behind it is rebuilt.
Protecting faces and plates in your own photos is fine. Passing off someone else’s picture as yours, or misleading anyone, is not.
Further reading
- arXivDefeating Image Obfuscation with Deep Learning (2016)↗
McPherson, Shokri and Shmatikov trained neural networks to identify faces and objects hidden by pixelation (mosaicing) and blur. The reason this page tells you to use large blocks or a black box when someone must not be recognised.
- WikipediaPixel art↗
Where the blocky look comes from, and what separates hand-made pixel art (limited palettes, deliberate outlines) from a photo run through a mosaic filter.
- MDN Web DocsCanvasRenderingContext2D: imageSmoothingEnabled↗
The browser setting this tool switches off when it scales the shrunken image back up, which is what gives each block hard edges instead of a blur.
Blocks in seconds, nothing uploaded.
Pixelate an image nowPixelation hides detail from casual viewers; for passwords, account numbers and people who must not be identified, use the black box. Only edit images you have the right to share, and don’t use edits to mislead anyone. See our Acceptable Use Policy.