Photoshop 'Pixelating' Web Images (v27x)

Question

Have Photoshop 27.10.0 on Windows 10 Pro, AMD RYZEN 5. Recently, resizing and exporting any types of raster images are coming out very “pixelated” (looking like old-school 80’s low-rez images!)

I tried turning back to v27.9.0, same thing. Searched online, found that I should make sure that under Preferences > General tab, that “Image Interpolation” should be set to “Bicubic Automatic” or “Bicubic Sharper” to fix that issue. Tried both settings - no luck. Tried changing to “Bicubic Smoother”, still the same, crappy results.

Is there some manual “reset” I need to do (like Command-line code, or going into some buried subfolder and deleting some reference file or something) to stop this from happening? It’s making my web images look horrible!

Sample

From 2024:

Now:

D Fosse · Accepted Answer

​@Jim239090900pzfYou’re resampling 658 x 371 pixels down to 125 x 71 pixels. That’s the explanation. It looks pixelated because it is. It’s not Photoshop; it’s the small image size.The size of an image is measured in pixels, not in physical dimensions or pixels per inch (ppi). Those are both derived numbers.You can use the ppi number as a parameter for resampling, which is what you’ve done. But the main thing is still that you’re reducing the pixel size.Pixels per inch is a way to translate from pixels into a physical size, where that is needed. On screen you already have a resolution: the physical screen resolution of your particular display. So it’s not needed and is ignored.Image pixels just align to the screen pixel grid.On paper there is no such pixel grid, so one has to be invented. This is the ppi number: pixels per inch. It means exactly what it says.

caring_Flutterb421 · Answer

I’d check the resizing/export process before assuming the preferences are corrupted. In Image > Image Size, make sure Resample is enabled and try Bicubic Sharper (reduction) or Automatic. Also make sure Nearest Neighbor isn’t being used, since that will intentionally create a pixelated result.

I’d also check Image > Mode and confirm the document is RGB Color, not Indexed Color or Bitmap.

As a quick diagnostic, export the same image as both JPEG and PNG and compare them at 100% zoom. If the PNG looks clean but the JPEG looks blocky, it’s likely an export/compression setting rather than Photoshop’s interpolation.

If the problem happens even when you’re not resizing, then I’d try resetting Photoshop’s preferences as a troubleshooting step. That would help determine whether this is a Photoshop settings issue or something specific to the source/export workflow.

If you can share the original pixel dimensions → resized dimensions → export format/settings, we can probably narrow down exactly where the pixelation is being introduced.

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