Pixelate, Blur or Black-Out PNG (Privacy Redaction)
Hide sensitive content in an image — pixelate, blur, or drop a solid block over a face, license plate, name, or API key. Drag a box right on the preview (or type an x,y,w,h rectangle), or redact the whole image; the change is baked into the pixels, with no layer to peel back. Everything runs in your browser, so the image you're redacting never leaves your device.
Drop image files here
Multiple files allowed
Pixelate vs Gaussian blur
- Pixelate — chunky, obviously-redacted look. Best when you want it visually clear that something was hidden. Amount = block size in pixels.
- Gaussian blur — softer, looks more "natural" in the composition. Amount = blur radius. Better for portraits where you don't want the redaction to dominate.
Picking the amount
- Pixelate 8 — minimum for legibly-obscuring small text.
- Pixelate 12 (default) — solid all-purpose redaction.
- Pixelate 20+ — strong for faces and large blocks of text.
- Blur 8 — soft. May still leak shapes.
- Blur 16 (default) — good for portraits.
- Blur 30+ — heavy, content unidentifiable.
Important caveat for sensitive data
For text (especially passwords, codes, account IDs), both pixelation and light blur can sometimes be reversed with image processing. If the information would harm you if recovered:
- Use heavy pixelate (block size ≥ 25% of the text height) or heavy blur.
- Or — much safer — switch the mode to Solid block: it paints opaque pixels over the area, so there's nothing left to reconstruct.
- Or use Crop to remove the region entirely.
Finding the x,y,w,h rectangle
(0,0) is the top-left. To get coordinates:
- Open the image in macOS Preview or Windows Photos — they show pixel position on hover.
- Or use a desktop editor with rulers (Photoshop, GIMP, Affinity).
- Or eyeball it: the file list shows image dimensions, so you can math out a rough rectangle.
Common use cases
- Bug report screenshot. Blur a customer's name / email before posting to GitHub.
- Selling a phone / car. Pixelate the license plate, IMEI, serial number.
- Documentation. Heavy-blur API keys, tokens, dev console output.
- Photo with kids / strangers. Blur faces before publishing.
- Whole-image blur. Background for a text overlay.
FAQ
Can blurred or pixelated text be recovered?
Sometimes, yes. Security researchers have reconstructed pixelated and lightly-blurred text (e.g. the "Unredacter" tool). For anything that would harm you if recovered — passwords, account numbers, keys — use this tool's Solid block mode (it paints opaque pixels that can't be recovered), or crop the region out entirely, rather than relying on pixelation or blur.
Is the redaction "baked in"?
Yes — the output pixels are the redacted pixels. No editable layer to peel back. Once saved, the original content is gone (from that file).
Multiple regions on one image?
Run the tool multiple times — output one redaction, drop it back in, redact the next region.
Does it work on transparent PNGs?
Yes — alpha is preserved. The blur respects transparent regions; pixelate may average in transparent pixels at region edges.
Part of: Prepare a screenshot for documentation
Redact before you crop only if the crop might not remove it. Otherwise crop first — fewer pixels, fewer mistakes.
- 1 Crop Cut it down to the part you are talking about
- 2 Pixelate Black out keys, names and account numbers
- 3 Add padding Breathing room so it does not touch the text
- 4 Drop shadow Lift it off the page background
- 5 Remove metadata Screenshots carry the machine name on some systems
Part of: Redact an image before sharing it
Pixelating a face is reversible in principle; a solid block is not. For anything that matters, use the block.
- 1 Pixelate Pixelate, blur or drop a solid block over a region
- 2 Remove metadata Strip GPS, camera serial and editing history
- 3 Chunk viewer See every chunk still in the file, byte by byte
- 4 Inspector Confirm the metadata has really gone