I cannot get my photoshop for some reason to save as 300 DPI jpegs. It keeps coming out at 72 DPI.

[f5pt6]

I cannot get my photoshop for some reason to save as 300 DPI jpegs. It keeps coming out at 72 DPI.  When I open the raw files, or any file for that matter it always opens in raw file viewer.  Even if it's a JPEG.  When I open these files in the raw file viewer and I check the resolution they always seem to say 300 DPI.  But when I open them on another computer they say 72 DPI.  See attached file. This is how it looks on my computer.  But on another computer it says 72 DPI.  Also can't get photoshop to stop asking if I want to save file even after I've already saved it when I want to close the window.  Please help folks.  Thanks.

[davescm · Accepted solution]

Are you saving or exporting?

Save should save the ppi metadata with the image. However Export, which was designed for screen use, strips out that metadata and actually saves with no ppi value at all. On opening an image without a ppi tag value, Photoshop assigns 72ppi just as a working value. Other software does similar but may assign a different default value.

In short - to retain the 300ppi value use Save or Save As.

Note : None of this affects your image pixels, it is just a value held alongside the image and is used by a print driver to calculate a physical size when printed.

Dave

[f5pt6]

I am saving as JPEG. Not exporting.

--
Avi Steinhardt
[Personal data removed by moderator]

[davescm]

If you are saving, then the ppi value will be saved in the file. What software are you opening them with that reports 72ppi? How did you transfer the file from your PC to the other?

Dave

[f5pt6]

I’m saving them in Photoshop and sending them via dropbox. --
Avi Steinhardt

[Personal details removed by moderator - please do not post personal contact information in this public forum]

[davescm]

Can you save an example file with 300ppi as jpeg and post it here (use the online post box and click on the image symbol - replying by email will not attach the image)

Dave

[f5pt6]

I've attached a screen shot of an image with the image size window open.  I've also attached two images I uploaded to Dropobox last night, which I'm pretty sure I saved at 300ppi and when I saved them to my desktop just now from Dropox they are smaller size files and also at 72ppi.

[f5pt6]

Just to add, I'm opening the raw files up in Adobe Bridge and then saving them in photoshop seemingly at 78.1M and 300 DPI When I just saved the image to my desktop and opened it up again it was now 39.1M and 72 DPI.  I honestly cannot figure out what I'm doing wrong here.

[f5pt6]

Actually think I may have solved it.  Apparently the keyboard shortcut Quick Export as JPG does not save the image full size, but only at 7 instead of 12?

[Conrad_C · Accepted solution]

Yes, that is what davescm meant when he asked whether you were saving or exporting.

In Photoshop, “save” refers to Save As or Save a Copy. Those commands always embed the ppi metadata.

“Export” means Quick Export or Export As. Those commands never embed the ppi metadata, because they’re intended for web/screen delivery where ppi has no meaning. So that is why the ppi metadata wasn’t coming through.

(Save for Web (Legacy) is sort of an odd one. It doesn’t embed ppi metadata unless All is selected in the Metadata menu.)

Apparently the keyboard shortcut Quick Export as JPG does not save the image full size, but only at 7 instead of 12?

By @f5pt6

Quick Export is sort of an “express” feature that lets you export in one quick step, and it always does it the same way. Fortunately, you control what it does. If you open Preferences and select the Export panel, the top section is Quick Export Format. Whatever you enter there is what the Quick Export shortcut will do.

One problem here is that you are not going to get a JPEG Quality level of 12, because it maxes out at 7. So if you want to max it out it’s 7. (One of life’s great mysteries is why there are multiple JPEG Quality scales, such as 1–7, 1-12, and 0-100, among different commands just within Photoshop, and also compared to Lightroom and Camera Raw.)

What you probably can’t solve in Quick Export is the ppi. You see a Quick Export Metadata section in those preferences, but including ppi is not an option (such as in the All option in Save for Web). Again, because Photoshop tends to export ppi metadata with the print-oriented Save As and Save a Copy commands, but not for any of the web/display oriented commands that have Export in the name.

[f5pt6]

So basically you're saying there is no longer a shortcut to save a jpeg at full resolution anymore.  I have to do a save as and then pull down to jpeg every time?

[Stephen Marsh]

Actually think I may have solved it.  Apparently the keyboard shortcut Quick Export as JPG does not save the image full size, but only at 7 instead of 12?

By @f5pt6

So basically you're saying there is no longer a shortcut to save a jpeg at full resolution anymore.  I have to do a save as and then pull down to jpeg every time?

By @f5pt6

For Export As or Quick Export, 7 (Great) is the equivalent of Save As 12. 

This is getting slightly dated, but hopefully, it helps to see an "apples-to-apples" comparison. The table reads from left to right, top to bottom:

Photoshop 2021
Save As		Save for Web (Legacy)		Export As
Save As JPEG, Level 12 Baseline Standard	3,382,351 bytes (3.4 MB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 100	3,035,739 bytes (3 MB on disk)	Export As, Great (7)	2,951,329 bytes (3 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 11 Baseline Standard	2,549,259 bytes (2.6 MB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 92	2,520,944 bytes (2.5 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 10 Baseline Standard	2,072,956 bytes (2.1 MB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 84	2,128,221 bytes (2.1 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 9 Baseline Standard	1,813,312 bytes (1.8 MB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 76	1,826,102 bytes (1.8 MB on disk)	Export As, Excellent (6)	1,835,030 bytes (1.8 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 8 Baseline Standard	1,597,234 bytes (1.6 MB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 68	1,579,870 bytes (1.6 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 7 Baseline Standard	1,245,822 bytes (1.2 MB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 60	1,301,819 bytes (1.3 MB on disk)	Export As, Very Good (5)	1,324,234 bytes (1.3 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 6 Baseline Standard	905,668 bytes (909 KB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 52	1,173,631 bytes (1.2 MB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 5 Baseline Standard	837,439 bytes (840 KB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 44	742,928 bytes (745 KB on disk)	Export As, Good (4)	695,320 bytes (696 KB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 4 Baseline Standard	786,204 bytes (786 KB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 36	658,904 bytes (659 KB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 3 Baseline Standard	740,953 bytes (741 KB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 28	596,724 bytes (598 KB on disk)	Export As, Fair (3)	590,963 bytes (594 KB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 2 Baseline Standard	753,850 bytes (758 KB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 20	546,622 bytes (549 KB on disk)	Export As, Poor (2)	563,817 bytes (565 KB on disk)
Save As JPEG, Level 1 Baseline Standard	709,518 bytes (713 KB on disk)	Save for Web (Legacy), Quality 12	437,863 bytes (438 KB on disk)	Export As, Very Poor (1)	498,396 bytes (500 KB on disk)

Minor file size differences are mostly due to the inclusion or exclusion of metadata. I believe that the entries in red are a bug (level 2 should create a smaller file size than level 3), I tested multiple times just in case I made a mistake.

[Stephen Marsh]

If you like use Export As or Quick Export, there is a way to embed 300ppi into a JPEG (not PNG) after export, which does not affect image quality as it doesn't decompress and recompress the binary image data, it only updates metadata which is fast:

Photoshop Script Version:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/photoshop-ecosystem-discussions/photoshop-script-to-add-missing-resol...

Bridge Script Version:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/bridge-discussions/bridge-script-to-add-missing-resolution-metadata-t...

Then there are 3rd party software tools such as ExifTool etc.

[f5pt6]

This is awesome but I'm not an expert on this scripting stuff at all, just a lowly technically challenged photog who wants to make a keyboard shortcut to save as a full resolution 300ppi jpeg.  The stuff you're talking about is Greek to me.

[Stephen Marsh]

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@f5pt6 wrote:

This is awesome but I'm not an expert on this scripting stuff at all, just a lowly technically challenged photog who wants to make a keyboard shortcut to save as a full resolution 300ppi jpeg.  The stuff you're talking about is Greek to me.

---

People use scripts all the time in Photoshop without even realising it, the difference is that they are preinstalled.

1. Copy the code text to the clipboard
2. Open a new blank file in a plain-text editor (not in a word processor)
3. Paste the code in
4. Save as a plain text format file – .txt
5. Rename the saved file extension from .txt to .jsx
6. Install or browse to the .jsx file to run (see below)

https://prepression.blogspot.com/2017/11/downloading-and-installing-adobe-scripts.html#Photoshop

This suggestion is a compromise, you don't have to use Export As or Quick Export (which strips PPI metadata) – but if you do and also want PPI metadata, then you now have an option. Otherwise, use Save As/Save As a Copy or Save for Web (Legacy) + All Metadata option – which does include the Resolution/PPI metadata.

[davescm]

I've just come back to this this morning, I had to get some sleep last night. Thanks to Stephen an Conrad for stepping in and getting to the bottom of the issue which was Exporting rather than Saving.

A couple of bits of info for clarity.

The ppi value does not itself affect the image quality. Whether you make it 1ppi or 1000ppi the pixels in the image do not change at all. All it does is tell the printer how big to print the image using those pixels. Literally how many pixels fit in one inch across the paper. That is why the ppi value is omitted from exporting which was designed to export images for screen use. An onscreen image does not need, or use, the ppi metadata.

Save a Copy, and using jpeg, will save a flattened jpeg and include the current ppi value in the metadata unchanged.

The quality slider in jpeg saving affects the compression level not the ppi metadata. This does change image pixels as jpeg uses lossy compression. The lower the quality value, the higher the compression.  This results in a smaller file on disk but with more image degredation (lossy compression cannot be reversed).

Dave

[davidscommcare]

Would be very helpful to give 'Export As' the option to include PPI metadata.

It has a better user interface than Save As in many ways, including support for Art Boards, and a checkbox added to include PPI data is strongly suggested.