What's the difference between "Export as: Jpeg or do "Save for Web (Legacy)""

[LMLBB10]

Hello!

I was wondering if someone could explain the me the difference in quality between exporting a PSD in one of the two manners below:

1) Export AS and then choosing a Jpeg and 100% Quality.

Versus

2) Save as Web (legacy) with 100% quality.

Both on SRGB.

I see many tutorials using option 2 (Save as web) and was wondering why?

For info: my PS is 2021. Thanks.

[Bojan Živković]

In Save for Web (legacy) dialogue you have more/additional options and finer control plus it can strip unecessary data for web. Otherwise you should not see difference in quality of image if equal options and quality is chosen.

Update: I missed point, in my answer Save for Web and Save As are compared.

[Chuck Uebele]

Export as will eventually replace save for web, but they're still refining it. It does or will have better saving quality.

[Conrad_C]

Save for Web has been around for so many years that the code is getting old and creaky. Large documents take forever to load into it. Save for Web also does not handle current web standards such as 2x/3x scale factor export.

Export As is new code with more up-to-date capabilities for web/mobile graphics production. But it isn’t fully completed; it has less control over metadata and can’t save an optimized animated GIF. Until Export As can do everything Save for Web does, Save for Web will be kept around. But Adobe added (Legacy) to the name to let everyone know that it is on the way out eventually.

Note that there are two Export As commands that do different things. File > Export > Export As exports entire artboards; that’s why it’s on the File menu.  Layer > Export As exports individual layers to separate files, so it’s capable of generating layer-based assets for web/mobile developers to integrate into projects.

[D Fosse]

There are still shortcomings in Export As that basically makes it useless. The most serious one is that it cannot be used in actions. It just doesn't record. That's a dealbreaker.

I also don't understand why "embed color profile" is still not checked by default. At the very least it should stick and stay checked once you do it - but you have to remember to check it every single time. It's ridiculous. Yes, I realize there are still situations where an embedded profile is not needed or irrelevant, but in that case it does no harm. It's just ignored anyway. And no, don't tell me about file sizes. It's 3 kilobytes.

The main argument for keeping it checked is very simple: it matches Photoshop. The initial mismatch between Export/Save For Web and Photoshop causes confusion and damage no end.

[LMLBB10]

Thanks for all your replies! That was so clear and helpful. On quality: would you choose nearest neighbor, bicubic, etc? Which one of those would be my most used option? Thank you again.

[D Fosse]

For photographic images, bicubic. For hard edge graphics, if you need to preserve sharp pixel edges, nearest neighbor.

All the Bicubic algorithms have some sharpening built in, the difference is how much. Bicubic smoother has very little, bicubic sharper a little too much and it can easily look oversharpened. Bicubic automatic just switches between smoother for upsampling and sharper for downsampling.

If you're really fussy, you might want to resize to final size first, using bicubic smoother, then sharpen - and only then send it to Export. This way you have full control over sharpening. You don't have to sharpen, but any resizing will soften the image and it usually pays off to fine-tune the sharpening if you want maximum impact.

But to answer your question - plain Bicubic (not automatic) is the fallback.