Lossless Compression
What is Lossless Compression?
Lossless compression is a type of digital image file compression which preserves all image data and quality when saved. Whereas Lossy compression can accumulate to significant compression and loss of image quality across several saves, lossless compression does not suffer from this drawback.
A few examples of lossless compression image formats include: RAW, BMP, and PNG.
When to use Lossless Compression
When saving an image which may need to be edited later it is best to save it in a lossless format. If, instead, it were saved in a lossy compression format the compression would stack with each save. Using a lossless format will preserve the image quality throughout multiple edits.
If a lossless file size is unreasonably large for display on the web, or in another file-size-sensitive medium, it is recommended to use an acceptable level of lossy compression so as to not compromise on image quality.
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