This circle crop turns any picture into a round one. Open an image and it's framed by the largest circle that fits in its middle. Zoom in and drag to choose exactly which part fills the circle, add a ring if you want one, and download a PNG in which everything outside the circle is transparent. Nothing is cut out or changed by AI, so the picture stays as it was, only rounded. It's instant and free, and the image never leaves your device.
How the circle crop works
- The starting circle. The crop begins with the largest square that fits in the center of your image, and the circle fills that square. On a wide landscape photo that's the middle section; on a tall portrait, the middle band.
- Zoom. From 100 to 400%, closing in toward the center of the circle. Each step leaves fewer of the photo's pixels inside the circle, so the download has fewer pixels the further you zoom.
- Drag. Move the picture to choose what sits inside the circle. It stops at the photo's edges, so there's never an empty gap in the circle, and Re-center puts it back.
- Ring. An optional border inside the edge of the circle, 1 to 12% of its width, in white, black, green or gold.
- Size. Leave the width empty for the full size of the crop, or type a width in pixels. The pixel size you'll get appears under the download button.
- Square. Switch the shape to Square for a square crop with the same zoom and position.
Because there's no AI model to load, the crop appears as soon as the image opens, on a phone as well as on a computer.
Why the circle is a PNG
An image file is always a rectangle. A round picture is really a square picture whose corners hold nothing, and that emptiness has to be stored as transparency. PNG can store it, and so can WebP, the other download option. JPG can't: it has no alpha channel, so a circle saved as a JPG gets solid corners, usually white, sometimes black. That's where the familiar white square around a round photo comes from.
Keep the circle as a PNG wherever you use it, and it sits cleanly on any color. If a form will only take a JPG, you can still convert the PNG to JPG and choose white or black for the corners to match the page it will appear on. To check that the corners really are empty, place the image on a dark slide or page: transparent corners show the dark color, and a fake shows a box. Formats that can hold transparency are compared on the page about transparent backgrounds.
What round images are good for
- Profile pictures and avatars. Most apps round a square upload themselves, but a ready-made circle shows you what people will see. To cut yourself out and set a new background color behind you, use the profile picture maker instead.
- Team and speaker pages. Round headshots in a row look tidy when each one is framed the same way, with the faces filling about the same share of each circle.
- Slides and documents. A round photo breaks up a page of rectangles, and with transparent corners it works on a colored slide as well as a white one.
- Logos and badges. A square logo becomes a round badge, and the ring adds a border in one step.
- Round labels and stickers. Many labels and stickers are round, so a circle-cropped image is ready to place in the design.
Tips for a clean round crop
- Center what matters. The circle keeps only about 79% of the square around it, so corners disappear. Keep faces, text and the important part of a logo away from the edge.
- Leave some room. A face that touches the circle looks cramped at small sizes; zoom out a step so there's space above the hair.
- Watch the resolution. At 200% zoom, the circle is half as wide in pixels as at 100%. For a large, sharp result, start from a big image and zoom no more than you need.
- Pick a ring that contrasts with the page. A white ring disappears on a white page and a black one on a dark theme. Green or gold can pick up a color from the picture.
- Size the ring for where it will be shown. Its width is a percentage of the circle, so a 1% ring that looks fine on a large photo is about one pixel wide in a 98-pixel avatar.
Frequently asked questions
Why does my round picture have white corners?
Somewhere it was saved as a JPG, or placed in an app that fills transparent areas. A JPG can't store transparency, so the corners become a solid color. Keep the PNG from this page, which leaves them transparent.
Does the circle crop change the picture itself?
No. There's no AI and no retouching: the picture inside the circle is your original, only rounded off. The one change you can make is the size, by typing a width.
Can I put a person in a circle without the background?
Yes, on the profile picture maker. It cuts the subject out with AI, puts it on a color of your choice and frames it in a circle, while this page keeps the whole photo inside the circle.
Can I crop to a square instead?
Yes. Choose Square instead of Circle, and the same zoom and position give you a square crop, downloaded as a PNG or WebP.
How do I get the same size for several round photos?
Type the same width, for example 600 pixels, before each download. The file is always square, so every photo comes out the same size, and zoom each one so the faces fill their circles alike.
Does it work on a phone?
Yes. Choose a photo from your gallery, drag with a finger to move it inside the circle, and download. Nothing is uploaded, and without an AI step the crop is instant even on an older phone.