Guides ·
What is a WebP file, and how do you open one?
A modern image format that every browser reads and a lot of desktop software still refuses. Where it came from, why you keep meeting it, and what to do with one.
A WebP is an image, like a JPEG or a PNG, that compresses about 30% better than either. Every current browser displays them. A lot of desktop software still will not open one, which is why you have probably arrived here holding a file you cannot use.
WebP against the formats you already know
| WebP | JPEG | PNG | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Photographs | Excellent — around 30% smaller than JPEG | Good | Very poor, enormous files |
| Graphics and text | Excellent, lossless mode available | Poor, fuzzy edges | Excellent |
| Transparency | Yes, including partial | No | Yes |
| Animation | Yes | No | No |
| Opens in browsers | All current ones | All | All |
| Opens in desktop software | Patchy, improving | Everywhere | Everywhere |
| Age | 2010, mainstream from 2020 | 1992 | 1996 |
The short version: WebP does what JPEG and PNG each do well, and does both better. Its only real weakness is that it is younger than the software people run.
Why you keep meeting it
Websites serve it because it makes pages faster, and page speed affects both rankings and how many visitors stay. When you right-click and save an image, you get the file the site served — which is increasingly a WebP, whatever the picture is of.
That is the whole reason this is confusing. You did not choose the format, nobody mentioned it, and the file lands on your desktop looking like something broken.
How to open one
In a browser, just drag the file into a tab. Every current browser displays WebP, which is a fast check that the file is fine and it is the software that is not.
On Windows, Photos supports WebP on Windows 10 and 11. Older software often does not.
On macOS, Preview has handled it since Big Sur.
In Photoshop, natively since 2022. Older versions need a plugin.
Anywhere else — Office, older editors, upload forms, print shops — converting is usually faster than fighting it. Converting to PNG keeps every pixel and any transparency; converting to JPEG gives a smaller file for a photograph but loses transparency.
Common questions
Is WebP better than JPEG? For compression, clearly — around 30% smaller at the same visible quality, and it supports transparency and animation, which JPEG cannot. For sending a file to another person, JPEG is still safer, because everything opens it.
Does converting WebP to PNG improve the quality? No. PNG is lossless, so it preserves exactly what is in the WebP, artefacts included. You get a larger file containing the same picture.
Why is my WebP file so small? Because that is the point of it. A WebP at a third the size of the JPEG it replaced normally looks the same; the compression is genuinely better rather than more aggressive.
Can WebP be animated? Yes, and it is a far better format for it than GIF — full colour instead of 256, and much smaller. It never displaced GIF culturally, which is why you rarely see one.
Is WebP lossy or lossless? Both. It has a lossy mode that competes with JPEG and a lossless mode that competes with PNG, and a file gives no outward sign of which it used.
Should I use WebP on my website? Yes, with a fallback. Every current browser supports it, and a
<picture> element with a JPEG alternative covers anything that does not.