Converts GIF to PNG. For a still image PNG is better in every respect — full colour instead of 256, and smooth transparency instead of GIF's all-or-nothing.
What PNG fixes
Colour. A GIF frame has at most 256 colours from a palette. Photographs and gradients are visibly banded or dithered as a result. PNG stores full 24-bit colour, so nothing is quantised.
Transparency. GIF has exactly one transparent palette entry — a pixel is either fully transparent or fully opaque. That is what gives GIFs their jagged, fringed edges against a background they were not designed for. PNG has 8 bits of alpha, so edges are smooth.
Converting cannot restore colours the GIF already discarded. What it does is stop any further loss and give you a format that handles edges properly.
Animation stops at the first frame
There is no widely supported animated PNG path here — APNG exists but is not what most tools mean by PNG. For animation, keep the GIF or convert to a video format.
Metadata is removed, which is usually the point
For a photo you are about to publish this is a feature. A JPEG straight off a phone can carry the exact coordinates of where it was taken, and stripping that before it goes anywhere public is good practice — the conversion does it as a side effect.
The one piece of metadata that is honoured before being dropped is the orientation flag. Phones store photos in the sensor's native orientation with a tag saying which way is up; ignoring it produces sideways pictures. It is applied to the pixels, so the result is upright without needing the tag.
If you need the EXIF preserved, this is the wrong tool — a converter that re-encodes cannot keep it.
Other names for this
Also searched as “convert gif to png”, “gif frame to png”.
Questions
- Will the animation be preserved?
- No. PNG holds a single image, so the first frame is used and you are told how many frames the source had.
- Will the colours improve?
- They will not get worse, and edges will be much cleaner. Colours the GIF already quantised away cannot come back.
- Why does my GIF have jagged edges?
- GIF transparency is one bit — fully on or fully off. PNG’s 8-bit alpha is what makes edges smooth.
- Can I convert a whole folder of images?
- Yes. Drop as many files as you like, or a whole folder. Each keeps its original name with the new extension —
IMG_4032.heicbecomesIMG_4032.jpg, neverconverted_1.jpg— and you can download them individually or as a ZIP. - Are my photos uploaded?
- No. The decoding and re-encoding happen in this tab using the browser’s own image support. Photos are personal in a way most files are not, and none of them is transmitted. Turn your Wi-Fi off and the converter keeps working.