Convert EPS to PNG
EPS is what logos arrived as for twenty years, and it is the format most likely to be sitting in a brand pack that nothing on your computer will open. It contains PostScript — drawing instructions, not pixels — so converting it means choosing a resolution to draw at, and the usual default is far too low.
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Add to Chrome — freeDrop your EPS file here, or click to browse
Up to 50 MB. Deleted automatically after 30 minutes.
What it does
- Rendered at 150 dpi, not the default 72
- Transparency preserved in the PNG
- Reads real PostScript, not just EPS-wrapped rasters
- No Illustrator, CorelDRAW or Ghostscript to install
How to use EPS to PNG
- 1
Add the EPS
Drop it in. Ghostscript reads the PostScript, which is what makes an EPS openable without any design software.
- 2
Rendered at 150 dpi
Roughly twice the usual default, and the difference between an image you can use and one you cannot.
- 3
Download the PNG
Lossless, with transparency intact where the drawing had it.
How it works
Ghostscript interprets the PostScript with its safety sandbox enabled, at a rendering resolution of 150 dpi set before the file is read. The drawing is rasterized at that resolution and encoded as PNG with transparency intact.
A file format that is a programming language
EPS is unusual among image formats and it explains both its longevity and its awkwardness.
The contents are a PostScript program. newpath 10 10 moveto 110 10 lineto
means what it says: move here, draw to there. An interpreter runs the program
and whatever it draws is the picture. That is why an EPS can be sharp at any
size — the program is re-run at whatever resolution is asked for — and it is why
opening one requires an interpreter rather than a decoder.
It is also why a converter must be careful. A language that can draw can, in principle, do other things: read files, write files, open connections. Ghostscript's sandbox has been the default since version 9.50 and is passed explicitly here anyway, because the file arrived from the internet.
Points and pixels
The single most common disappointment with EPS conversion is size, and it is arithmetic rather than quality.
The header of an EPS declares a BoundingBox in points. Points are 1/72 inch. At the near-universal default of 72 dpi one point becomes one pixel, so a drawing declared as 200 by 150 becomes an image 200 by 150 — a thumbnail of something meant for a page.
At 150 dpi the same file measures 417 by 313. That is the number this tool produces, and it is enough for a website header, a slide, or a document.
When you need more
Do not enlarge the PNG — the detail is not there to recover.
/eps-to-pdf keeps the drawing as vectors: the resulting PDF contains no embedded images at all, and renders 1667 by 1250 at 600 dpi from that same 200 by 150 point source. Render from the PDF, or hand the PDF to whoever needs it, which for a printer is the preferred thing anyway.
The preview image inside an EPS
A detail that explains a specific kind of bad conversion.
Many EPS files carry a low-resolution preview bitmap embedded alongside the PostScript — a TIFF or WMF thumbnail, added so that page-layout software of the 1990s could show something on screen without running an interpreter. It is typically 72 dpi and often only a few hundred pixels across.
Some converters read that preview instead of running the PostScript, because it is far easier. The result is a blurry, small image that looks nothing like the crisp artwork the file actually contains, and it is a common reason people conclude their EPS is low quality.
Ghostscript interprets the PostScript. The preview is ignored entirely, and what you get is the drawing itself, rendered fresh.
Examples
A logo from a brand pack
The file nobody could open becomes one everything opens. A 200 by 150 point logo renders 417 by 313 pixels.
A figure from an academic paper
LaTeX workflows produced EPS for decades. Modern editors and slide software want PNG.
Frequently asked questions
What is an EPS file?
Encapsulated PostScript — a program, technically, in the PostScript language, that draws a picture, wrapped with a header saying how big that picture is. It was the standard way to move artwork between programs from the late 1980s onward, which is why logos and academic figures are still distributed as EPS long after the format stopped being the obvious choice.
Why does the size of the result matter so much?
Because an EPS has no size in pixels. Its bounding box is in points, at 72 to the inch, and something must decide how many pixels each point becomes. Nearly every default is 72 dpi, which makes one point one pixel and turns a 200-point logo into a 200-pixel image. That is the reason vector conversions so often disappoint. Rendering at 150 dpi produces 417 pixels from that same file — measured.
Some EPS files are just a photograph. What then?
Those exist and convert fine, but the resolution advice reverses. An EPS that wraps a scanned image has a real pixel count of its own, and rendering it at 150 dpi may resample it up or down rather than draw anything. If the result looks softer than you expected, that is why, and the original raster is the better source.
I need it much bigger than 150 dpi gives me.
Use /eps-to-pdf, which keeps the artwork as vectors — nothing is rasterized at all — and render from that PDF at whatever size you need. Enlarging the PNG cannot add detail that was never drawn, because the detail was never drawn: the pixels beyond 150 dpi do not exist to be recovered, and every enlargement algorithm is guessing at them.
Does my file leave my computer?
Yes. PostScript is a programming language and running it safely needs Ghostscript with its sandbox on, which is a server job rather than a browser one. Your file and the result are both deleted within 30 minutes by a timer, and nothing is stored, indexed or kept against an account.