Compress an image to 10 KB
Add your image and it comes back under 10 KB. Read the first section before you use the result for anything that matters — at this size the format itself is close to its floor.
Compress to 10 KB
10 KB is near the floor of what JPEG can do
A JPEG needs roughly 0.15 bytes per pixel before it stops resembling the original. Ten kilobytes is 10,240 bytes, which works out to an upper bound of around 260 by 260 pixels for a photograph — smaller than the thumbnail on a messaging app.
So a 10 KB result from any tool, this one included, is a small picture. Anything claiming to give you 10 KB at full phone-camera dimensions is either not hitting 10 KB or is handing you something unusable. The result line here always states the output dimensions so you can see exactly what you got.
Signatures are the exception, and usually the reason
Most people who need 10 KB need it for a signature field, and a signature is the one thing that compresses beautifully at this size. It is a thin dark stroke on a large white field, which is close to the ideal case for both JPEG and PNG.
A scanned signature will often come in under 10 KB at its original dimensions with quality to spare. Convert it to greyscale before compressing and it gets smaller again. If the tool reports that it had to shrink your signature, the scan probably has a coloured or textured background that is costing more than the ink.
Making a 10 KB photo as good as it can be
Every pixel you remove before compressing is a pixel the encoder does not have to spend bytes describing.
- Crop to the subject and nothing else. On a headshot that means head and shoulders, no background.
- For a signature, crop to the ink, then convert to greyscale or black and white.
- Try WebP if the destination accepts it — at 10 KB the difference against JPEG is visible, not academic.
- Double-check the requirement. A 10 KB limit is often the minimum of a range such as 10 KB to 200 KB, not the maximum.
Questions people ask
Can a passport-style photo work at 10 KB?
It will be identifiable but soft, at roughly 250 pixels square. If the form displays it at thumbnail size that is fine; if a human reviews it closely, ask whether a larger limit is available.
Why does my signature come out so much smaller than 10 KB?
Because a signature is mostly one flat colour, which compresses extremely efficiently. Landing at 3 or 4 KB is normal and is not a sign that anything went wrong.
Is PNG or JPEG better at 10 KB?
PNG for a clean black-on-white signature, JPEG or WebP for anything photographic. PNG stores flat areas cheaply and photographic detail expensively; JPEG is the opposite.
Other sizes and tools
Last reviewed 2026-09-04. Also searched as: image compressor to 10kb, photo compressor to 10kb, reduce image size to 10kb, 10kb signature compressor.