About This Site

8-Bit Photo Converter is a free tool that turns any photo into authentic retro pixel art — right in your browser, with nothing ever uploaded to a server.

What it does

Upload a photo, pick a pixel size and a classic colour palette, and the tool instantly re-renders your image in the blocky, limited-colour style of 1980s and 1990s games consoles and home computers. You can download the result as a PNG and use it however you like. There is no sign-up, no watermark, and no cost.

The site currently supports eight palettes — Game Boy, NES, ZX Spectrum, PICO-8, Commodore 64, CGA, Black & White, and an "Original colours" mode that pixelates your photo while keeping its own colours.

Why we built it

Pixel art has an enduring charm. The strict technical limits of old hardware — four shades of green on a Game Boy, four colours on an IBM CGA card — forced a kind of creativity that still looks great decades later. We wanted a fast, no-nonsense way to see any photo through that lens, without installing software, creating an account, or handing your images to someone else's server. So we built a converter that does everything on your own machine.

Privacy comes first

Because all the image processing happens locally in your browser using the HTML5 Canvas API, your photos never leave your device. We can't see them, store them, or share them — there is simply no upload. This makes the tool safe to use with personal photos, screenshots, or anything you'd rather not send across the internet. You can read the full details in our privacy policy.

How it's made

The site is intentionally lightweight: pure HTML, CSS, and vanilla JavaScript, with no frameworks, no build step, and no tracking beyond standard privacy-respecting analytics. That keeps it fast, reliable, and easy to run on any device — from a phone to a desktop. It is hosted as a simple static site, which is part of why it loads quickly and works offline once the page is open.

Who's behind it

8-Bit Photo Converter is an independent project, built and maintained by a solo developer. It began as a personal experiment in retro image processing and grew into a tool used by thousands of people looking to make avatars, game mock-ups, stickers, and nostalgic artwork. If you'd like to suggest a feature, report a bug, or just say hello, head to our contact page.