Why every iPhone shoots HEIC by default.
Apple introduced HEIC, or High Efficiency Image Container, as the default photo format with iOS 11 and the iPhone 7 in 2017. HEIC uses the HEVC codec for image compression, which is significantly more efficient than JPEG's compression from 1992.
The practical benefit is substantial: HEIC files are roughly 50% smaller than equivalent JPEG files at the same visual quality. For a phone that stores thousands of photos, this means approximately half the storage space consumed. Apple made this switch specifically to manage storage on devices with fixed capacity.
As of 2025, there are approximately 1.46 billion active iPhones worldwide according to Statista. Every single one of them is producing HEIC photos by default. This makes HEIC one of the most widely produced image formats in the world, even though most websites and platforms still cannot display it natively.
If you have ever tried to upload an iPhone photo to a website and received an unsupported format error, HEIC is the reason. The format is excellent for storage but needs to be converted before most web platforms can use it. The question is: what should you convert it to? If you have been defaulting to JPG, you have been making the wrong choice.
Why converting HEIC to JPG is a mistake.
The most common workflow for using iPhone photos on the web is: take photo in HEIC, convert to JPG, then upload. This is the wrong approach.
HEIC is a lossy format. When the iPhone captures a photo, it applies HEVC compression and discards some image data permanently. The resulting HEIC file is already compressed. When you convert that HEIC to JPG, the converter decodes the HEIC data and re-encodes it using JPEG compression. This re-encoding applies a second round of lossy compression, discarding even more data.
This is called generation loss. Each time you re-encode lossy data into another lossy format, quality degrades. The degradation is especially visible around high-contrast edges, text, and fine details. And because JPEG's compression is less efficient than HEIC's, the resulting JPG file is often larger than the original HEIC despite being lower quality.
Think of it like photocopying a photocopy. The original is sharp, but each copy of a copy gets progressively blurrier. HEIC to JPG is exactly this: you are making a lossy copy of a lossy original, using an older and less efficient copying method. The result is predictably worse on both dimensions, larger file size and lower quality.
HEIC to WebP: the advantages.
WebP uses the VP8 codec for lossy and VP8L codec for lossless compression, which are modern compression algorithms comparable in efficiency to HEVC. Converting HEIC to WebP still involves re-encoding, but the quality preservation is significantly better than converting to JPG.
Better compression efficiency means WebP produces smaller files than JPG at equivalent visual quality, so you can use a higher quality setting and still get a smaller file. Modern artifact handling means WebP's compression produces less visible artifacting than JPEG, particularly around edges and in areas with fine detail. Alpha channel support means that unlike JPG, WebP supports transparency. Animation support means WebP can replace GIF as well. WebP is a web-native format designed by Google specifically for web use, so it integrates perfectly with Core Web Vitals optimization.
The bottom line: HEIC and WebP are both modern formats that speak the same language of efficient compression. Converting between them is like translating between two closely related languages, very little is lost. Converting HEIC to JPG is like translating a modern novel into an ancient language with a limited alphabet. Something is inevitably lost.
File size comparison: HEIC vs JPG vs WebP.
For a typical iPhone 15 Pro photo at 4032 by 3024 pixels, 12 megapixels, converted at quality 80: The original HEIC is about 1.8MB. Converting to JPG produces a 2.4MB file, 33% larger than the original, with visible generation loss. Converting to WebP produces a 1.6MB file, 11% smaller than the original, with minimal quality loss. Converting to PNG for lossless preservation produces a 12MB or larger file.
The key insight: converting HEIC to JPG produces a file that is both larger and lower quality than the original. Converting to WebP produces a file that is smaller than the HEIC original while preserving nearly all the visual quality.
These numbers are based on typical photographic content. Images with lots of fine detail like text, foliage, and hair show even larger gaps between JPG and WebP quality because JPEG's block-based compression creates more visible artifacts in high-frequency areas.
WebP browser support in 2026.
One of the historical arguments for converting to JPG was browser compatibility. WebP was introduced by Google in 2010, but Safari did not add support until Safari 14 in September 2020. This made WebP unreliable for a significant portion of web traffic.
In 2026, that argument is obsolete. According to Can I Use data, WebP has over 97% global browser support. Every current version of Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge, and Opera supports WebP natively. The only browsers lacking support are Internet Explorer 11 and very old mobile browsers with negligible market share.
For the remaining 3% of browsers, you can serve a JPG fallback using the HTML picture element. But for most sites, serving WebP directly without a fallback is perfectly acceptable. Google, Facebook, Netflix, and essentially every major website now serves WebP by default.
HEIC on social media and messaging apps.
If you upload HEIC photos directly to social platforms, something happens behind the scenes that most people do not realize: the platform converts your HEIC to JPEG automatically, using its own compression settings. You have no control over the quality.
Instagram. Instagram accepts HEIC uploads but immediately converts them to JPEG at its own quality level. The platform also resizes images to 1080 pixels on the longest side. If you upload a 12 megapixel HEIC, Instagram does three things at once: decode HEIC, resize from 4032 pixels to 1080 pixels, and re-encode as JPEG. You get a triple quality hit. Converting to WebP first and resizing to 1080 pixels yourself gives you control over the compression quality.
WhatsApp. WhatsApp compresses every image to roughly 70 to 100 kilobytes and resizes to approximately 1600 pixels regardless of the original format or size. Sending a HEIC file through WhatsApp means the app first converts HEIC to JPEG, then compresses that JPEG aggressively. The result is significantly degraded.
Facebook and Twitter/X. Both platforms accept HEIC and convert internally. Facebook re-encodes to JPEG at moderate quality. Twitter does the same but slightly more aggressively. In both cases, converting to a well-optimized WebP or JPEG yourself before uploading produces noticeably better results because you control the compression quality rather than letting the platform's algorithm decide.
The pattern is consistent across all platforms: if you let the platform handle conversion, you get their lowest-common-denominator compression. If you convert beforehand, you get better quality because the platform has less work to do.
HEIC vs WebP vs AVIF: which modern format to choose.
WebP is not the only modern format. AVIF, or AV1 Image File Format, is even newer, released by the Alliance for Open Media in 2019. It offers superior compression to both WebP and HEIC.
HEIC has about 18% browser support through Safari only. WebP has over 97% browser support. AVIF has about 93% browser support. In terms of compression efficiency, HEIC is excellent, WebP is very good, and AVIF is the best. For encoding speed, HEIC and WebP are fast while AVIF is 5 to 10 times slower. All three support transparency. HEIC has licensing fees while WebP and AVIF are royalty-free. HEIC is best for iPhone storage, WebP is the safest choice for web images, and AVIF offers the best quality-to-size ratio for web images.
AVIF produces files 20 to 30% smaller than WebP at the same visual quality. However, it has two significant drawbacks today: encoding is 5 to 10 times slower than WebP which matters for batch processing, and browser support is at about 93% versus WebP's 97% or higher. The gap is closing, but for production websites that need universal compatibility, WebP remains the safer choice.
The practical recommendation: convert HEIC to WebP for web use today. If you can serve AVIF with a WebP fallback using the picture element, that gives you the best of both worlds. But WebP alone is an excellent choice that works everywhere.
When JPG is still the right choice.
Despite WebP's clear advantages, there are a few scenarios where JPG remains the better target format. Email attachments to clients using older software, printing services that only accept JPG, PNG, or TIFF, legacy CMS platforms that do not handle WebP uploads, and older versions of Photoshop that require a plugin for WebP.
For all web-facing use cases in 2026, WebP is the correct choice over JPG.
The optimal conversion workflow.
For web use including blogs, websites, and e-commerce: convert HEIC to WebP at quality 80, resize to display dimensions typically 1200 to 1920 pixels wide, strip EXIF data for privacy, compress further if needed, and upload the optimized WebP file.
For editing in Photoshop or Lightroom: convert HEIC to PNG lossless to preserve maximum data for editing, edit in your application, then export the final result as WebP for web or JPG for print.
For archival storage: keep the original HEIC files since they are already efficiently compressed and contain all the metadata. Only convert when you need to use the photo somewhere that does not support HEIC.
Batch converting HEIC photos from your iPhone.
If you have dozens or hundreds of HEIC photos from a trip, event, or product shoot that need to be converted for web use, doing them one at a time is not practical. A batch workflow is essential.
The batch conversion process. First, transfer HEIC photos to your computer via AirDrop, iCloud, or USB cable. AirDrop is fastest for small batches but for large libraries USB transfer avoids compression. Second, open the HEIC Converter in your browser and select all HEIC files at once. SammaPix processes up to 20 images simultaneously on the free plan and 500 on Pro. Third, set output format to WebP and quality to 80. All files are converted with the same settings. Fourth, download all converted files. On Pro you can download everything as a single ZIP file.
The entire process runs in your browser. No files are uploaded to any server, which makes it fast even for large batches. The speed depends on your device's processor, not your internet connection. A modern MacBook can convert 50 HEIC photos to WebP in under 30 seconds.
Privacy: removing location data during conversion.
Every HEIC photo taken on an iPhone contains embedded EXIF metadata. This includes information most people do not realize is there. GPS coordinates showing the exact latitude and longitude where the photo was taken, accurate to within a few meters. Timestamp with the exact date and time including timezone. Device information including iPhone model, iOS version, lens used, and focal length. Camera settings like aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and exposure compensation. Unique identifiers including lens make, software version, and sometimes a unique image ID.
When you convert HEIC to another format, some converters preserve this metadata and some strip it. If you are publishing photos on a website or sharing them publicly, you should always strip EXIF data, especially GPS coordinates. Publishing a photo with GPS data reveals your exact location, your home address, your workplace, or the locations you frequent.
The recommended approach is to include EXIF removal as a step in your conversion workflow. After converting HEIC to WebP, run the files through the EXIF Remover to strip all metadata.
If you are managing images for a website and want to automate the naming as well, the AI Rename tool can generate SEO-friendly filenames based on image content, and the Alt Text Generator creates accessibility-compliant alt descriptions. Combined with EXIF removal and WebP conversion, this gives you a complete image optimization pipeline.
Frequently Asked Questions.
Why is HEIC to WebP better than HEIC to JPG?
Both HEIC and WebP use modern compression algorithms, while JPG uses technology from 1992. Converting HEIC to WebP preserves more visual quality because both formats handle compression similarly. Converting HEIC to JPG introduces a generation loss from re-encoding into an older, less efficient format. WebP files are also 25 to 34% smaller than equivalent JPG files at the same visual quality.
Does every iPhone shoot in HEIC format?
Every iPhone since the iPhone 7 running iOS 11 released in 2017 shoots in HEIC by default. You can change this in Settings, Camera, Formats, switching from High Efficiency to Most Compatible. However, HEIC produces better quality at smaller file sizes, so keeping HEIC and converting to WebP for web use is the optimal workflow.
Can all browsers display WebP images in 2026?
WebP has over 97% global browser support as of 2026 according to Can I Use data. Every major browser including Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge, and Opera supports WebP. The only browsers that lack support are very old versions like Internet Explorer 11, which has less than 0.3% global usage.
When should I still convert HEIC to JPG instead of WebP?
JPG is still the better choice when sending email attachments to clients with very old software, uploading to printing services that only accept JPG, working with legacy CMS platforms that do not support WebP, and sharing files with older versions of Photoshop. For all web use cases, WebP is superior.
Can I convert HEIC to WebP on my iPhone?
Yes. You can use a browser-based converter like SammaPix directly in Safari or Chrome on your iPhone. Open the HEIC Converter tool, select your photos from the camera roll, and convert them to WebP without installing any app. The conversion runs entirely on your device and your photos are never uploaded to a server. This works on any iPhone running iOS 14 or later.
Does converting HEIC to WebP remove EXIF data?
It depends on the tool. Some converters strip EXIF metadata during conversion, while others preserve it. HEIC photos from iPhones contain GPS coordinates, camera settings, and timestamps. If privacy is a concern, use a dedicated EXIF remover after converting to WebP, or use a workflow that includes EXIF stripping as a step. SammaPix EXIF Remover removes all metadata including GPS location data.
Originally published at sammapix.com
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