P: Inconsistent JPEG quality with 1-7 slider in Export As

clifton, there is something wrong with your settings somewhere. I'd recommend a preferences reset.

All four methods produce the same sizes at maximum quality (whatever that happens to be):

The only slight difference is Save As, which is slightly larger - perhaps due to metadata, which the other three strip. Note the original date is retained.

Just took a test image from 16-bit converted to sRGB, then to 8-bit per color. 

Save As... I picked JPEG, set the quality to 12

Quick Export, save the setting (quality 7)

Export As (Jpeg) save the setting (quality 7)

The three are pixel for pixel identical as seen in Calculation>Subtract one from each other. 

A few weeks back, I started noticing that quick-exported JPEGs I was making were much lower quality than I expected. It used to be that "Quality 7" meant that the file would be about the same filesize and compression level as "10 out of 12" on the "Save As" JPEG settings, which is just what I wanted. But now Quality 7 means "very small filesize, and extremely heavily compressed", and I can't choose anything higher.

I learned through reading other posts about Quick Export on this forum that the problem is likely due to the recently change in how the UI interprets that "Quality 7" number. The new system works fine for the normal Export mode, because it interprets "7", the highest number you can set, as "100% quality". But *Legacy* Export is now completely broken, as the max value of "7" seems to be getting treated as "7% quality", which is VERY heavily compressed. And even with the Legacy mode checkbox checked, you can't choose a value higher than 7.

Could you please fix this? It's completely screwed up my workflow, as I now have to save every JPEG as a Copy, so that I can access the non-broken quality slider.

Sorry, this is why I am sowing confusion. I mislabeled the file names as Quick Save. They are Quick Export, which is what I intended. See below.

See my reply to Stephen. I am suggesting it is a bug because the Export As maximum settings quality is much reduced now, compared to how it was in PS 23.2. I figured this was unintentional. If the developers deliberately want Export As maxiumum to be smaller and lossier than it was previously, then perhaps its not a bug.

Hi Stephen. Okay, I am posting my issue again, and I think I can demonstrate the problem more clearly this time because I am not working on other things at the same time. 

Let's forget about legacy Export As. Its not broken, and I was just using to demonstrate that Quick Export is, after version 23.3.

Instead, today, I installed PS version 23.2 and used the Quick Export maximum settings there, then re-installed 23.3.1, and used the Quick Export maximum setting there. Below are the results.

And here is the exif of each one:

Also, here are the settings used. First 23.2 at maximum (100), second 23.3.1 at maximum (7):

Okay, and the visual evidence. First, PS23.2 version, Quick Export 100 (maximum):

Second, PS23.3.1 version, Quick Export 7 (maximum):

Its obvious that the second is much more lossy than the first, as one would expect from a file so much smaller than the first.

Here is a close-up if these are not obvious enough. As you can see from the layer name, the left is Quick Export 23.2 maximum, the right is Quick Export 23.3.1 maximum.

In summary, I propose that Quick Export maximum settings in PS 23.2 should look exactly the same as in PS 23.3.1. Instead, Quick Export in 23.3 and later, is much lossier at maximum than previously, as also indicated in the much smaller file size. I figure this must be unintentional, which is why I suggested it was a bug.

Of course, the work around is to use Export As legacy, at 100% to achieve the same quality as Quick Export 100% in previous versions.

Hi Stephen. Yes, I see no difference in the layers on your PSD.

OK, but I asked if you could use the bottom layer (no lossy compression in this psd layer) to provide examples of what happens when you export.

Hi Stephen. Yes, I see no difference in the layers on your PSD.

Look, when I brought up this bug, I thought it was a simple thing.

I'm sorry, what bug? 

@clifton_santiago 

There must be something funky going on with your install.

I just tested with 2021 and 2022 in Windows. I even looked at version 2020 and compared an Export As 100% vs a 2022 level 7 Export and they are visually the same.

Again, I would ask that another user to test on their system with the same test file that I provided.