Taking the colour out of a photo can do a lot. A busy scene becomes calmer, a portrait feels more timeless, and a scanned page prints cleanly on a home printer. You can make an image black and white here in one press, without an app and without sending the picture anywhere.
This page opens Adjust image colour with the Filter set to Black & white, so the stage already shows your picture in greys. Add contrast for punch, lift the brightness for a dark photo, or switch to Sepia for an old-print tone. It is free and runs in your browser. Below: how the greys are worked out, how to keep the result from looking flat, and how to convert a whole set.
How to make an image black and white
- Press Select images, or drop one or more pictures onto the page. JPG, PNG, WebP, AVIF, GIF, BMP, TIFF, ICO and iPhone HEIC photos all open.
- The picture appears in black and white straight away, because the Filter is set to Black & white.
- Move Contrast up if it looks flat, or Brightness if it looks dark. Hold to compare shows the colour original while you press it.
- Keep Save as on Original, or pick JPG, PNG or WebP.
- Press Apply colour and save. The file name ends in _bw when only the Filter was used, or _colour once you have moved a slider as well.
Black & white is also one of the Quick looks, so if you try something else you can get back with one click. Reset clears everything, the Filter included, and the note under the button then asks you to move a slider or pick a look before it will save.
How a colour photo becomes a greyscale image
A greyscale image keeps how light each part is and drops its colour. The tool works out that lightness the standard way: green counts for most, red for less and blue for least, which follows how bright each colour looks to the eye. So a bright yellow flower stays light, and a deep blue shirt turns quite dark.
That matters because two colours that look very different can come out as nearly the same grey. A red apple on green leaves is a good example: in colour it jumps out, in black and white the two can blend together. When that happens, raise Contrast to pull the tones apart, or accept that this picture works better in colour.
The Filter is applied after the sliders. Brightness and Contrast shape the grey picture as you would expect, while Saturation makes little or no difference once the colour is gone, and Warmth only shifts the greys slightly.
| Setting | What you get | When to use it |
|---|---|---|
| Filter: Black & white | Pure greys with the lightness of the colours | Most black and white photos |
| Filter: None, Saturation at Grey | Much the same greys, made by the slider | When you might want some colour back later |
| Filter: None, Saturation 20 % to 40 % | A hint of colour left | A muted, nearly black and white look |
| Filter: Sepia | Warm browns instead of greys | An old-photo feel |
Make a black and white photo look good
Without colour, a black and white photo lives on light, shadow and shape. These habits help most pictures:
- Add contrast. Many photos look grey and flat once the colour is gone. Contrast between 115 % and 135 % often brings the depth back.
- Watch the brightest parts. Too much Brightness turns pale skies and white shirts into blank white with no detail left. Use Split view and drag the divider over them to check.
- Zoom in on faces. Press + to zoom and 0 to fit again; zoom changes only your view, never the result.
- Choose photos with strong light. Shadows, texture and clear outlines carry a black and white picture more than colour ever did.
- For documents, add plenty of Contrast. A photo of a letter or a receipt reads better with darker text and a whiter page.
For a warmer look, pick Sepia under Filter instead: it gives the soft brown of an old print, and Brightness and Contrast work on it in the same way. If you want the opposite of a photo rather than its greys, use invert image colours.
Convert photos to black and white in one go
Select up to 100 pictures to convert photos to black and white together. Each one gets the same Filter and the same slider values, and the button counts them: Apply to 12 pictures. Click a picture in the strip under the stage to preview the settings on it before you run, and Save all as ZIP keeps the results in one file. A file that cannot be opened says Can’t open on its card and is skipped.
Save as Original keeps a JPG as a JPG and a PNG as a PNG, while an iPhone HEIC photo becomes a JPG and a GIF, BMP or TIFF becomes a PNG. JPG and WebP are saved again at high quality, and PNG keeps every pixel. A transparent PNG keeps its transparency as PNG or WebP; saved as JPG, the clear parts turn white.
- It runs in your browser. The picture is never uploaded, and our server does no picture work.
- It is free, with no account and no watermark. Image tools are not counted in the free daily limit, which applies to document conversions only.
- The saved picture is drawn fresh, so it carries no location, camera or date details.
- It works in current Chrome, Edge and Firefox. Very large pictures may be too big for your browser.
Once the greys look right, other pages can take the picture further: pixelate image to hide a part, flip photo to mirror it, circle crop image for a round avatar, or make image square for a square post.
Turn your photo black and white now
To make an image black and white, open it above: the Filter is already set. Shape it with Contrast and Brightness, check it with Hold to compare, and press Apply colour.
It is free, private and works in your browser, for one picture or up to 100 at a time.
