How to Compress a Photo to 20 KB (or Any Size)

The quick way

1. Open the page for your limit: 20 KB, 50 KB, 100 KB, or Compress Image and type any size in Target size (KB).
2. Drop in your photo. It is saved as a JPG at the highest quality that fits under the limit.
3. Download it. The new size is shown next to the file.

The photo is processed on your own device, which matters for passport photos and signatures.

Why a small limit needs a smaller picture

A phone photo is often 3 to 5 MB: 4000 pixels wide or more. Lowering the JPG quality alone cannot bring that down to 20 KB without turning it into blocks, so the width and height have to come down too. A passport-style photo of about 300 × 400 pixels fits comfortably in 20 to 50 KB and still looks sharp on screen.

If the form also asks for exact dimensions, set those first with Resize Image, then compress.

Signatures

Sign on plain white paper with a dark pen, photograph it in good light, and crop it close to the signature. A tightly cropped signature of 300 × 100 pixels is usually well under 10 KB.

What "KB" means on a form

Some sites count 1 KB as 1,000 bytes and others as 1,024. The compressor keeps the file under the lower number, so it passes either way. If a form still rejects it, check the file type: many forms accept only JPG, not PNG or HEIC.