TIFF to WebP

Photographers deliver TIFFs, museums digitise collections as TIFF and scanners default to it, but a website cannot show a TIFF at all. WebP is the opposite: compact, widely supported by browsers and able to keep transparency. Converting TIFFs to WebP is the fastest way to get high-quality scans online.

Size first, quality second

The biggest saving comes from pixel size, not from compression. A 60-megapixel archive scan is about 9500 pixels wide; a gallery page rarely shows images wider than 1200 pixels, or 2400 for high-density screens. Switch on “Limit size” and enter the longest side you need. Scaling is done in halving steps, which keeps fine lines crisper than a single large reduction.

Picking a WebP quality

The quality slider starts at 90 percent, a safe choice for artwork and detailed photos. For thumbnails and editorial photos, 75 to 85 percent usually looks the same and saves considerably more. Check textures such as fabric, paper grain and foliage at full size before settling on a value for a whole batch.

Multi-page and transparent TIFFs

Every page of a multi-page TIFF is converted to its own WebP, which suits galleries where each page is shown separately. Alpha channels are preserved, so cut-out product photos and logos stay transparent. 16-bit TIFFs are reduced to 8 bits per channel, as web images always are.

Browser support for encoding

All current browsers display WebP, but Safari cannot create WebP files: asked for one, it silently writes a PNG. The converter tests this before starting and shows a clear message, so you never end up with a mislabeled file. On a Mac, use Chrome, Edge or Firefox for this conversion, or choose TIFF to JPG, which works in every browser.

A sensible workflow for archives

Keep the TIFFs as your master files. Generate web copies at a fixed size, say 2400 pixels on the long side, at 82 percent quality, and publish those. When a page needs a different size later, convert again from the master rather than from a WebP, so quality never degrades over generations. Store the masters somewhere backed up and separate from the web folder; the WebP copies are disposable and can always be regenerated in minutes, while a lost master scan may mean handling a fragile original again.

Other options

For pixel-exact web images of graphics, use TIFF to PNG. If your site supports AVIF, Image to AVIF can produce even smaller files from the same scans. And for documents that should stay together, TIFF to PDF keeps every page in one file.

Batch settings that work for most archives

For editorial photos and artwork, a longest side of 2400 pixels at 82 percent quality is a reliable default; for thumbnails and listing pages, 800 pixels at 75 percent. Black-and-white documents and line drawings compress better as PNG, so keep those out of a WebP batch. Name your folders by size, for example web-2400 and thumbs-800, so the variants never get mixed up. Converting from the TIFF master each time also means you can redo the whole set later with different settings without any generational loss.