WEBP image saving
Join us in our mission
For over a decade, we’ve been on a mission: to help everyone in the world learn how to do anything. Today, we’re asking that you join us. You can request publication of your article for publication by sending it to us via our Email
1. The Background:
You may have noticed that when you save images from the internet, some of them are saved as a WEBP format. WEBP is a relatively new file format that allows for images to retain more information while being smaller than PNG or JPGs . While this is great for web browsing, it’s not always ideal if you’re trying to use that image for something else. Many photo editors and other programs don’t know how to read WEBP files yet. In this article, we’ll teach you ways you can save a WEBP file as a JPG (or JPEG) so you can use those images in other projects.
2. Things You Should Know
- Paint on Windows and Preview on Mac can both open WEBP files, and from there you can save those files as JPGs.
- If you copy the image or screenshot it, you can open that image in any editor of your choice and save it as a JPG.
- You can use a desktop or website-based converter to convert WEBP into JPG easily, which is a good choice if you have multiple images to convert.
3. Find a WEBP image you want to save.
4. Right-click the WEBP image.
5. Select Copy Image.
6. Open a photo editor of your choice.
7. Create a new file.
- Paint will automatically open with a blank file, so you don’t need to make a new one.
- If you’re using Preview, click the Preview menu item in the top left, then select File > New from Clipboard.
8. Paste the image into the new file.
- If you’re using Preview and you pasted from your clipboard, you can skip this step.
9. Save the image as a JPG.
10. Download a WEBP image.
11. Open Paint.
12. Open the WEBP image.
13. Click File and then Save as.
14. Select JPG in the dropdown beneath the file name.
15. Click Save.
Exporting in Preview (macOS)
16. Download a WEBP image.
Ctrl-click the image and select Save image (though different browsers may have slightly different wording). If you’re on Mac, you can download a WEBP image and open it in Preview to save it as a different file type, including JPG.
17. Navigate to the image in Finder.
The default download location is your Downloads folder inside your user folder.
18. Double click the image.
This will open it in Preview. If the image doesn’t open in Preview automatically, you can click File > Open With once you’ve selected your image file in Finder. From there, you can select Preview.
19. Select File > Export.
This will allow you to save the file as a different file type. You can change the image’s name and save location if you prefer.
20. Select JPEG in the dropdown at the bottom of the page.
This will ensure your photo is saved as a JPG.
21. Click Save.
The image is now saved as a JPG. If desired, you can delete the WEBP image from your downloads.
Editing the URL
22. Open the WEBP image in a new tab.
23. Remove the -rw at the end of the URL and press ↵ Enter.
- On Mac you will need to press ⏎ Return instead of ↵ Enter.
24. Right-click the image.
25. Download the image.
Take a Screenshot
26. Find a WEBP image.
You can either screenshot directly from a webpage, or open the image in a new tab by right-clicking or Ctrl-clicking the image and selecting Open in new tab. Different browsers may have differently worded options.
27. Press the screenshot button.
On Windows computers, this is ⎙ PrtScr and on Mac it is ⌘ Cmd+⇧ Shift+3.
28. Open a photo editor of your choice.
You can use Paint on Windows or Preview on Mac, or any other photo editor you’ve downloaded such as Photoshop, Lightroom, Canva, GIMP, or others.
29. Create a new file.
Each program will behave a bit differently, but most of the time you can click File > New to make a new file.
- Paint will automatically open with a blank file, so you don’t need to make a new one.
- If you’re using Preview, click the Preview menu item in the top left, then select File > New from Clipboard.
30. Paste the screenshot into the new file.
- If you’re using Preview and you pasted from your clipboard, you can skip this step.
31. Crop as necessary.
32. Save the image as a JPG.
33. Install an extension to convert WEBP images.
- WebP / Avif image converter for Chrome and Firefox
- Save image as Type for Chrome
- Opera users can install Chrome extensions in their browser to save WEBP images as JPG
- Safari nor Microsoft Edge do not appear to have any extensions to save WEBP images as JPG
34. Save your image.
Online Converter
35. Download a WEBP image.
36. Go to CloudConvert.
- CloudConvert is one of many web converters. Feel free to use a different web file converter, but note that the instructions may be slightly different.
37. Click the first dropdown in the top gray bar and select WEBP.
You can either search for WEBP or hover Image and scroll down until you see WEBP.
38. Click the second dropdown in the top gray bar and select JPG.
39. Click the red Select File button.
40. Navigate to your downloaded image and open it.
41. Click the red Convert button if everything looks good.
42. Save the image once it has been converted.
Desktop Converter
43. Download a WEBP image.
44. Download and install a desktop converter.
45. Open XConvert.
46. Select the Input tab and click the Add files button.
47. Select the Output tab.
- You can also change where your images are saved by adjusting the settings at the top of the window. You can have the images saved to the folder where your WEBP image is saved, or you can direct it to a different location.