Is it safe to convert images online?
It depends entirely on the tool, and the difference is bigger than most people realise.
What usually happens when you convert an image online
You choose a file. Your browser uploads it to a server. Software on that server rewrites it into the format you asked for. You download the result. Somewhere in the footer, a line promises the original will be deleted within an hour, or a day.
That promise is unverifiable. You cannot see the server, you cannot audit the deletion, and you have no way of knowing who else has access in the meantime. For a photograph of a sunset, none of that matters. For the files people most often need to convert, it can matter a great deal.
The files people actually convert
Look at what drives image conversion and the risk becomes concrete:
- Passport and visa photographs, which are biometric records
- Signatures, scanned for bank forms and applications
- Identity documents — driving licences, national ID cards, residence permits
- Medical letters and certificates, uploaded to insurers or employers
- Photographs of children, converted from an iPhone’s HEIC so relatives can open them
These are exactly the files you should be most reluctant to hand to an anonymous website, and they are exactly the files that most often need converting, because forms are strict about formats.
How to tell whether a converter uploads your file
You do not need to take anyone’s word for it, including ours. Three checks settle it in under a minute.
1. Watch the network. Open your browser’s developer tools (F12, or Cmd+Option+I on a Mac), switch to the Network tab, and convert a file. If the tool uploads, you will see a request carrying several megabytes leaving your machine. If it does not, you will see nothing of the sort.
2. Pull the plug. Load the page, disconnect from the internet, then convert. A tool that works offline cannot be sending your file anywhere. A tool that stops working was relying on a server.
3. Read what happens next. If a site emails you a download link, or gives you a URL that works from another device, your file is stored somewhere. That is not automatically sinister, but it is the opposite of private.
Why in-browser conversion became possible
For most of the web’s history, uploading was genuinely necessary — browsers could not decode and re-encode images themselves. That changed. Every current browser ships complete image codecs, and WebAssembly covers the rest, running formats like HEIC, AVIF and TIFF at close to native speed inside a tab.
So the upload is no longer a technical requirement. Where it still happens, it is usually because the site was built that way years ago, or because holding the files is useful to whoever runs it.
What to look for
- Conversion happens in the browser, and the site says so plainly enough that you can test it
- No account, no email address required to convert something
- No file size cap — server-based tools need caps because processing costs them money
- No queue at busy times, for the same reason
- A privacy policy that says what happens, rather than only promising eventual deletion
What we do
Every conversion on this site runs inside your own browser. There is no upload step because there is nowhere for the file to go — we never receive your images, cannot store them, and could not produce them if someone asked. Run the three checks above on this site and you will see it holds up: no upload appears in the Network tab, and the tools keep working with the network switched off.
That is also why there are no limits here. Nothing costs us anything per conversion, because the work happens on your machine rather than ours.