ShopsyCrop Shopsy Label with Invoice & Order Details
GlowRoadCrop GlowRoad Label with Invoice & Order Details
23-09-2026 · Quick Cropper
The settings in the PNG to SVG converter change how closely the SVG follows your image and how big the file gets. Here is what each one does, so you can pick the right values instead of guessing.
This quick walkthrough explains the SVG colour, detail and smoothing settings one by one.
This is how many colours the tracer keeps, from 2 to 64. Similar shades are grouped together, and each group becomes one layer of shapes.
A flat, poster-like look with a small file. Ideal for simple logos.
Keeps soft shading and detail, but the file grows and tracing takes longer.
Low detail smooths away tiny features for fewer, cleaner paths. High detail follows every edge closely - good for small text, but it makes more shapes.
Smoothing softens the image before tracing. Leave it off for sharp artwork; raise it for photos of logos, scans or compressed JPGs that have speckles.
With gradients on, linear and radial gradients become real SVG gradients instead of stripes of flat colour, so smooth colour transitions stay smooth.
The four settings are not independent. A high colour count with high detail creates the most accurate trace but also the largest file and the longest processing time. A low colour count with low detail creates a very clean, simple file, but small features may disappear. Smoothing affects both, because it removes noise before the tracer counts colours and follows edges. Understanding these links helps you change one setting at a time and see exactly what it does, instead of changing everything at once and not knowing which change helped.
4 to 8 colours, medium detail, smoothing off, gradients off.
12 to 24 colours, medium detail, gradients on.
2 to 8 colours, low to medium detail, smoothing on.
16 to 32 colours, medium to high detail.
Black and white mode instead of colour mode.
The side-by-side preview is the best guide to your settings. Zoom in on the edges of shapes: jagged or wobbly outlines suggest raising smoothing or lowering detail. Look for colour areas that should be one colour but appear as two; lowering the colour count merges them. Check small text and fine lines; if they are missing or broken, raise the detail. Keep an eye on the file size shown after each conversion, and stop increasing settings as soon as the preview looks right.
Gradients are great for artwork with smooth colour blends, but they are not always wanted. For printing on vinyl, embroidery, screen printing or cutting machines, flat colours are easier to produce, so turn gradients off and use a low colour count. Some older software also handles SVG gradients poorly, so if a file looks wrong in a particular program, try exporting it again without gradients.
What is the best number of colours? The lowest number that still looks right in the preview.
Does more detail always mean better quality? Not always. More detail can add noise and make the file much bigger without a visible improvement.
Once you find settings that work well for a type of image, write them down. For example, you might note one set of values for your company logo, another for scanned signatures and another for product icons. Next time, you can start with the right values straight away and get a clean result on the first try. Very large source images can be scaled down first with the Image Resizer to keep tracing quick, and QR codes are best downloaded as SVG straight from the QR Code Generator.
Start with a low colour count and medium detail, then increase only what the preview shows you need. The smallest settings that still look right give the best SVG.