Online Photo Editor – Adjust, Filter, Rotate & Crop Photos Free

Most photo fixes take thirty seconds: brighten the shadows, add a little contrast, straighten the crop, done. This free online photo editor puts exactly those controls in one place — brightness, contrast, saturation and exposure sliders, six filter presets, rotate and flip buttons, and one-click crop shapes for social media. It runs entirely in your browser; your photo is never uploaded.

Every change previews live on the real pixels, and the download is the full-resolution result, not a shrunken copy.

How to edit a photo

Click the file box and choose a photo.
Drag the sliders: brightness and exposure lift a dark shot, contrast adds punch, saturation controls colour intensity.
Optionally pick a filter preset, rotate or flip the frame, and choose a crop shape (1:1 for Instagram, 16:9 for video thumbnails, 9:16 for stories).
Download as JPG for a small file, or PNG for lossless quality.

A worked example, with the numbers

Take a dull 3000 × 2000 indoor photo. Exposure +0.7 EV multiplies brightness by 2^0.7 ≈ 1.62 — the editor folds that into the brightness filter, so a brightness setting of 100% behaves like 162%. Add contrast 115% and saturation 120% and the grey cast lifts. Crop to 4:3 and the editor keeps the centre 2667 × 2000 pixels. Rotate it once and the file becomes 2000 × 2667 — dimensions swap, exactly as they should.

What each control actually does

Brightness scales every pixel’s light value. Gentle: 90–115%.
Exposure works in photographic stops (EV). +1 EV doubles the light — the same maths your camera uses, and stronger than the brightness slider alone.
Contrast stretches the gap between dark and bright pixels. Too much crushes shadows to black.
Saturation at 0% gives black and white through the back door; 150%+ is the oversaturated social look.
Presets are combinations: Warm adds sepia and saturation, Cool shifts hue, Vivid pushes both saturation and contrast.

When this editor is the right tool

Quick product photos for marketplaces: brighten, crop square, done.
Social media prep: crop shapes for posts, stories and thumbnails without opening a heavy app.
Fixing a scan or a screenshot: contrast and invert rescue faded documents.
Privacy: because nothing uploads, even sensitive photos (IDs, documents) are safe to adjust here — and our blur tool can hide the parts that should stay hidden.

Honest limitations

This is a global editor: it adjusts the whole frame at once, with no brushes, layers, healing or face retouching. Filters use your browser’s canvas engine, which every modern browser supports. Crops are centre crops — for choosing exactly which part of the frame survives, a dedicated cropper gives finer control. Edits are baked in only when you download; the preview never touches your original file.

A reliable 30-second recipe

For a typical dull photo, in this order: exposure +0.3 EV, contrast 112%, saturation 112%, then look. Dark indoor shot: exposure +0.7 EV first, contrast after — contrast before brightness just deepens the gloom. Faded scan or old print: contrast 125%, brightness 105%, saturation 130% to wake the colour. Product photo on white: brightness 108%, contrast 108%, crop 1:1, and leave saturation alone so the colour stays honest. Small steps in the right order beat one big slider drag every time.

Frequently asked questions

Does editing reduce my photo’s resolution?

Only if you crop: the download keeps the full (possibly cropped) pixel dimensions. Filters, rotation and flips do not shrink anything.

JPG or PNG download?

JPG for photos — small files, opens everywhere. PNG if you plan to edit further or the image has text and sharp graphics.

Is my photo uploaded to a server?

No. All processing happens in your browser tab, so the editor even works offline once the page has loaded.

Embed this tool on your website — free

Copy the code below to add this working tool to your own page. A small credit link stays with it — that’s all we ask.