Image Transformations

With Uploadcare, you can easily build custom image transformation workflows and automate most of image manipulation and optimization tasks. For example, you can set up a chain of actions for user-generated images that'll unify their look.

Сhange format, crop and resize images to fit any design and any screen on the fly. Adjust image colors, apply artistic filters, and enhance. You can use and stack transformations right in the image URL:

Original image
Original image		Sharpened image
Sharpen -/sharp/15/		Enhanced image
Enhance -/enhance/100/

Every URL transformation generates a modified image version on the fly, while the original file stays intact. The transformed image version will be cached on CDN nodes to optimize delivery.

https://ucarecdn.com/:uuid/-/resize/200x/

You can stack multiple transformations (e.g., overlay the source image). Uploadcare supports virtually any image input format. The processed output formats are distilled down to: PNG, JPEG or WebP.

Also, you can use Proxy to apply image transformations without explicitly uploading them:

https://yoursite.ucr.io/-/preview/-/resize/500x/https://yoursite.com/assets/image.jpg

Full list of image transformations

Limitations

This section describes the limits to consider when implementing Uploadcare Image Transformations.

Core Operations

When applying image transformations, add at least one of the following operations via their respective URL directives:

Output Image Dimensions

The dimensions you specify for the last operation should not exceed 3000x3000 pixels. You can increase that limit to 5000x5000 pixels by explicitly setting your image format to JPEG, /format/jpeg/.

File Size

We don’t provide on-the-fly image transformations for images greater than 75 Mpx in resolution: those can only be delivered via CDN as-is.

Simple Rotation

When the only image transformation you want is rotating, consider using the preview control without any arguments. When you use any of the transformations, we automatically rotate images according to their EXIF orientation.

Animated Images

Animated images are treated as static by the transformations engine, consider checking out our GIF to Video workflow optimized for animated images delivery.