300 vs 600 DPI

For photos, 300 DPI is enough. 600 DPI only makes a visible difference for sharp-edged content like text, line art and scans of documents. Here is how to choose.

Choose 300 DPI for

• Photos, at any print size you will look at up close.
• Flyers, brochures, cards and invitations.
• Anything sent to a regular print shop, unless they ask for more.

Printing a photo at 600 DPI rarely looks better: photographic detail is soft by nature, and the printer cannot reproduce the extra pixels as visible detail. You just get a file four times larger.

Choose 600 DPI for

• Scans of text, contracts and receipts you want to read or run through OCR.
• Line art, logos, comics and illustrations with hard edges, if they are raster images.
• Scanning small originals, like stamps or slides, that you plan to enlarge.

File size

Doubling the DPI doubles the pixels in each direction, so the file has four times as many pixels. An 8 × 10 inch image is 2400 × 3000 pixels at 300 DPI (7.2 megapixels) and 4800 × 6000 at 600 DPI (28.8 megapixels).

What about vector files?

Logos and illustrations saved as vectors (SVG, EPS, PDF, AI) have no DPI: they print sharp at any size. If you have the vector version, send that instead.

Ready to set your file? Use the 300 DPI converter or the 600 DPI converter.