How do JPG and BMPcompare? Here's everything you need to know to choose the right format — and how to convert between them.
Joint Photographic Experts Group
JPG (also known as JPEG) is the most widely used image format for photographs and complex images. It uses lossy compression to significantly reduce file size while maintaining acceptable visual quality.
Bitmap Image File
BMP is an uncompressed raster image format native to Windows. While it produces very large files, BMP preserves every pixel with zero quality loss, making it useful for raw image data and legacy applications.
| Specification | JPG | BMP |
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Joint Photographic Experts Group | Bitmap Image File |
| Extension | .jpg | .bmp |
| MIME type | image/jpeg | image/bmp |
| Category | Image | Image |
| Developer | Joint Photographic Experts Group | Microsoft |
| Year introduced | 1992 | 1986 |
| Compression | Lossy | Lossless |
Choose JPG for smaller file sizes, especially for photos and web content. Choose BMP when you need lossless quality, transparency, or pixel-perfect output.
Need to switch formats? Convert for free with SquishConvert.