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Resolution

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
March 6, 2021
4 replies
769 views

I know the best photo resolution is 300 for photoshop. But what is the highest resolution?

Thanks for the answers!

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Correct answer D Fosse

No, you need to stop and go back to start. This is the wrong way to see it. There is no "best" resolution, only what is required for whatever purpose.

Resolution expressed as pixels per inch, ppi, is exactly what it says: how many image pixels to how many inches of paper. It only applies to print.

Your image is just pixels. When you print, you want a certain minimum pixel density to get a good quality print. That imposes a limit to how big you can print it. The bigger the size, the lower the pixel density. That density is expressed as pixels per inch, ppi.

300 ppi for print is a myth. It only applies to a very specific limited scenario: offset print for books and magazines. In that scenario, 300 ppi is the theoretical upper limit. Anything higher will not give any improvement.

As size goes up, ppi requirement goes down, because it will be seen from that much farther away.

Conrad_C

Community Expert

I just tried entering a resolution of 1 million ppi in Photoshop, and it limited it to 29999.999 ppi.

So that is one answer, that is the highest resolution you can enter in Photoshop.

But in practical use, the range of typically used ppi resolution values is 75 to maybe 600, or 1200 for line art. As the others are saying, the right resolution depends on the job, the final display/print device, and the intended viewing distance.

If you specify a resolution that is too high, your files will be so large that they will take up too much storage space, and take too long to upload and download,.

D Fosse

Community Expert

A lot of the confusion around this is because "resolution" is not an unambiguous term. In digital imaging, it can have two distinct meanings:

* total number of pixels

* pixel density in a given area

These two meanings are related, but not interchangeable. They need to be kept separate. The first definition would be known in Photoshop as "Image Size". But if you buy a camera, it will often be referred to as sensor resolution.

The second definition is the pixels per inch number. That's pixel density, and it might better be called just that.

barbara_a7746676

Community Expert

I agree with D Fosse that the best resolution is what is required for the purpose of the image.

To answer your question about what is the highest resolution that Photoshop will support, it is 300,000 by 300,000 pixels, or 29999.99 pixels per inch.

OtakuGirl2005Author

Participating Frequently

Thank you for your answer! 😊

D Fosse

Correct answer

Community Expert

No, you need to stop and go back to start. This is the wrong way to see it. There is no "best" resolution, only what is required for whatever purpose.

Resolution expressed as pixels per inch, ppi, is exactly what it says: how many image pixels to how many inches of paper. It only applies to print.

Your image is just pixels. When you print, you want a certain minimum pixel density to get a good quality print. That imposes a limit to how big you can print it. The bigger the size, the lower the pixel density. That density is expressed as pixels per inch, ppi.

300 ppi for print is a myth. It only applies to a very specific limited scenario: offset print for books and magazines. In that scenario, 300 ppi is the theoretical upper limit. Anything higher will not give any improvement.

As size goes up, ppi requirement goes down, because it will be seen from that much farther away.

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