# How to convert a PDF to PNG without losing quality > To convert a PDF to PNG without losing quality, use PDF to PNG and choose High (300 DPI) for print or small text, or Normal (150 DPI) for screens. PNG itself loses nothing, so the sharpness of the result is set by the resolution you choose when the page is drawn. Page: https://pdfinish.com/blog/how-to-convert-pdf-to-png-without-losing-quality Last updated: October 31, 2026 By PDFinish editorial team. Published October 25, 2026. People worry about quality when they turn a PDF into a picture, and they are right to. But the worry has two parts. One is the file format. The other is the resolution. With PNG, only one of them can hurt you. PNG is a lossless format. It stores every pixel exactly as drawn, with no extra blur added when the file is saved. That means the quality of your PNG is set at one moment: when the page is drawn into pixels. Choose that moment well and the image will be as sharp as you need. ## Where quality is actually lost A PDF is a set of instructions. It says draw this letter here, in this font, at this size. A page like that stays sharp at any zoom, because the viewer redraws it every time. A PNG is different. It is a fixed grid of pixels. Zoom in far enough and you see squares. So the "loss" is a change from sharp-at-any-zoom to sharp-up-to-a-point. You cannot avoid that in any conversion to a picture. What you can do is make the point far enough away for your use. ## Pick the right DPI [PDF to PNG](https://pdfinish.com/pdf-to-png) offers two settings. Pages are drawn at the DPI you pick, and PNG keeps the result exactly. - Normal (150 DPI): good for viewing on a screen, in a document, on a slide or in a message. - High (300 DPI): better for print, for small text, and for pages you may zoom into. The files are larger, and a long document takes longer. A simple rule: if someone will print the image or zoom in on fine print, use High. If they will look at it once on a screen, use Normal. ## Convert in four steps 1. Open [PDF to PNG](https://pdfinish.com/pdf-to-png) and add your PDF. It is drawn in your browser, so the file is not uploaded. 2. Pick the pages you want, instead of converting the whole file. 3. Check that the format says PNG, then choose Normal or High. 4. Download the zip file with one PNG for each page. ## When PNG beats JPG, and when it does not PNG is the better choice for pages with small text, tables, charts and line drawings, because hard edges stay clean. JPG is the better choice for photos, because its files are smaller and the loss in a photo is hard to see. The trade-off is file size. A PNG of a text page at High is much larger than a JPG of the same page. If the image has to be small, try Normal first, or use [PDF to JPG](https://pdfinish.com/pdf-to-jpg) for photo pages. Our guide on [converting PDF to JPG without changing the size](https://pdfinish.com/blog/how-to-pdf-to-jpg-without-changing-size) shows the pixel math for both formats. ## What PNG cannot give back - Selectable text. A PNG holds pictures of words, not words, so you cannot copy or search them. - Links and form fields. These are lost, because the page is flattened into pixels. - A see-through background. Pages are drawn on a white background, so the PNG is white behind the page. If you need any of these, keep the PDF alongside the image. ## What to do with the PNGs afterward Once you have the images, a few habits keep them sharp. - Shrink, never enlarge. Making a PNG smaller for a web page is safe. Making it larger adds no detail, it only stretches the pixels you have. - Use the image at or below the size it was drawn. A page drawn at Normal is fine for a screen but will look soft if you print it large. - Put images back into one file if you need to. [JPG to PDF](https://pdfinish.com/jpg-to-pdf) accepts PNG, JPG and WebP pictures and gives each its own page, so you can rebuild a PDF from the images. - Keep clear file names. The zip names each image by page, so keep the page order if you rename them. And if you find you need the text back, go to the original PDF, because no picture can return it. ## A worked example A freelancer wants to put one page of a proposal, with a pricing table in small type, on her website. She tries Normal and finds the table slightly soft when she zooms in on a laptop. She converts again at High, the table is crisp, and the file is bigger but still fine for a web page. She uses Normal for the image she sends in a chat, where nobody zooms. ## Tips for the sharpest result - Start from the best PDF you have. If the PDF page is a low-quality scan, the PNG will be a faithful copy of a low-quality scan. - Convert only the pages you need, to keep the zip small. - Open the image at the size it will be shown, not larger, before you judge it. - Very large pages are scaled so the longest side is at most 10,000 pixels. For a poster-sized page, expect a slightly smaller image than the DPI alone suggests. Free files can be up to 50 MB, and your 2 free uses in total need no account. For a small file in the other direction, see [JPG to PDF](https://pdfinish.com/jpg-to-pdf). ## Common questions ### Does converting PDF to PNG lose quality? PNG does not blur or degrade the image when it saves. The page does change from sharp at any zoom to a fixed set of pixels, so pick High (300 DPI) if you need to zoom or print. ### Should I choose 150 or 300 DPI? Use Normal (150 DPI) for screens and messages. Use High (300 DPI) for printing, small text and pages people may zoom into. ### Why is my PNG so big? PNG stores every pixel exactly, and High has four times the pixels of Normal. Use Normal, convert fewer pages, or use JPG for photo pages. ### Will the text in the PNG be searchable? No. The PNG holds a picture of the words, so keep the PDF if you need to search or copy the text. ### Is my PDF uploaded when I convert it? Not with PDFinish. PDF to PNG draws the pages in your browser, so the document stays on your device. ## Try it - [PDF to PNG](https://pdfinish.com/pdf-to-png): Save each PDF page as a sharp PNG image. - [PDF to JPG](https://pdfinish.com/pdf-to-jpg): Save each PDF page as a JPG image. - [Extract Pages from PDF](https://pdfinish.com/extract-pdf-pages): Keep only the pages you pick and save them as a new PDF. This article is general information, not legal or tax advice.