What is the difference between “JPG” / “JPEG” / “PNG” / “BMP” / “GIF” / “TIFF” Image?

Question

I have seen many types of image extensions but have never understood the real differences between them. Are there any links out there that clearly explain their differences?

Answer 1

Since others have covered the differences, I'll hit the uses.

TIFF is usually used by scanners. It makes huge files and is not really used in applications.

BMP is uncompressed and also makes huge files. It is also not really used in applications.

GIF used to be all over the web but has fallen out of favor since it only supports a limited number of colors and is patented.

JPG/JPEG is mainly used for anything that is photo quality, though not for text. The lossy compression used tends to mar sharp lines.

PNG isn't as small as JPEG but is lossless so it's good for images with sharp lines. It's in common use on the web now.

Personally, I usually use PNG everywhere I can. It's a good compromise between JPG and GIF.