Print quality
Why WhatsApp photos print blurry, and how to get the originals
A photo that looks perfect on a phone can print soft, and the usual reason is that it isn't the original. Somewhere between the camera and you, an app made it smaller.
What chat apps do to photos
A modern phone camera takes photos about 4,000 pixels wide. Sending those over mobile data is slow, so messaging apps quietly shrink them. By default WhatsApp, Messenger and most others cut a photo down to somewhere around 1,600 pixels on its long side, sometimes much less, and compress it harder as well.
On a phone screen you can't see the difference. On a printed page 21 centimetres wide you can: edges go soft and faces lose their detail.
How to tell if a photo has been shrunk
- It was saved from a chat, a social network or a website.
- Its file size is a few hundred kilobytes. Originals are usually two to five megabytes.
- On an iPhone, open the photo, swipe up, and look at the size in pixels. Anything under 1,600 on the long side has been reduced.
On Paper Chain you don't need to check by hand. Any photo too small to print well is flagged the moment it's added, and the organiser sees who added it so they know who to ask.
Five ways to get the original
- Have the person who took it add it themselves. This is the simplest fix. They open the family link on the phone that took the photo and choose it from their camera roll. Nothing gets shrunk on the way.
- Use WhatsApp's HD option. When sending a photo, tap the HD button at the top before you send. It sends a much larger copy.
- Send it as a document. In WhatsApp, tap the plus or paperclip, choose Document, and pick the photo from there. Documents aren't compressed.
- AirDrop or Nearby Share, if you're in the same room.
- Email it at actual size. When an iPhone asks which size to send, choose Actual Size.
What we do with small photos
If a small photo is all there is, it still goes in the book. We print it smaller on the page rather than stretching it until it blurs, so it stays sharp. You see the size it will be before you order.
Old prints are different. A phone photo of a paper photograph, taken in good light, is a full-size original and prints well. See how to scan old photos with your phone.