Invert Image Colours Online
Turn any photo into a negative in one click — or go further than a plain invert with per-channel control, a hue-preserving luminance mode, and a proper film-negative converter that removes the orange mask from scanned negatives. Everything runs in your browser, so your images are never uploaded anywhere.
Drop images here
or click to browse · or paste with Ctrl+V
JPG · PNG · WebP · GIF · BMP · AVIF
Inversion mode
0% keeps the original, 100% is a complete inversion.
Presets
Your images are never uploaded. Every pixel is processed inside this browser tab.
People also use
Everything this tool does
True 255 minus v inversion
The full negative mode applies the textbook formula to every red, green and blue value, so the output is an exact photographic negative and inverting twice restores the original bit for bit.
Per-channel control
Switch red, green and blue on or off independently. Inverting one channel gives you real duotone shifts that no slider-based filter can reproduce.
Hue-preserving luminance invert
Converts to HSL and flips only lightness. Dark becomes light while colours keep their identity — ideal for turning a white scan into a dark-mode document.
Film negative with auto-levels
Inverts, then stretches each colour channel using its own histogram to remove the orange film base mask. This is the step almost every free invert tool skips.
Intensity blending
A linear 0 to 100% mix between original and inverted. Useful for faded overlays, background plates and subtle poster effects.
Drag-to-compare preview
A split handle wipes between the untouched image and the inverted version at full preview resolution, so you judge the result before you commit.
Batch processing with ZIP
Queue as many images as you like, apply one set of settings to all of them, and download the entire batch as a single ZIP built in your browser.
Transparency preserved
The alpha channel passes through untouched for PNG and WebP output. Export to JPG and you choose the colour that fills the transparent areas.
Change settings without re-uploading
Adjust any control after a run and the button becomes Re-apply. Your files stay in the queue, so experimenting costs nothing.
Nothing leaves your device
No upload, no server queue, no temporary storage to delete. Close the tab and every trace is gone with it.
What each mode does to a colour
The four modes are genuinely different pieces of maths, not four names for the same filter. This table traces the same four input colours through each one so you can pick the right mode without guessing.
| Input colour | Full negative | Red channel only | Luminance only | Intensity 50% |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Black 0,0,0 | White 255,255,255 | 255,0,0 | White 255,255,255 | Grey 128,128,128 |
| White 255,255,255 | Black 0,0,0 | 0,255,255 | Black 0,0,0 | Grey 128,128,128 |
| Blue 0,128,255 | 255,127,0 | 255,128,255 | 0,128,255 (mid) | 128,128,128 |
| Green 34,197,94 | 221,58,161 | 221,197,94 | 58,221,118 | 128,128,128 |
Note the pure blue row: in luminance mode its lightness is already 50%, so flipping it lands on the same value. That is expected behaviour, not a bug — mid-lightness colours are their own luminance opposite.
4
inversion modes
0
files uploaded
3
channels, independent
100%
reversible in PNG
ZIP
batch download
Free
no account needed
FlipMyFormat vs other invert tools
| Capability | FlipMyFormat | Typical free tool |
|---|---|---|
| Files stay in your browser | ||
| Per-channel R / G / B inversion | ||
| Hue-preserving luminance invert | ||
| Film negative mask removal | ||
| Partial intensity blending | ||
| Batch ZIP download without paying | ||
| No watermark on the output |
How to invert image colours
Inverting an image sounds like a single operation, but which inversion you want depends entirely on what you are trying to achieve, and choosing wrongly is the reason most people end up disappointed with a one-click negative. If you want a straight artistic negative — the X-ray look, a shock-contrast poster, or a quick check that a logo reads on a dark background — full RGB inversion is correct and you should leave the intensity at 100%. If you are inverting a white-background document so it is comfortable to read at night, full inversion is the wrong tool, because it turns every coloured highlight into its complement and makes red annotations look cyan; luminance mode flips the page from white to near-black while leaving the highlighter yellow and the ink red, which is what your eye actually expects from a dark theme. If you have photographed or scanned a strip of 35 mm film, neither of those will satisfy you, because a colour negative is manufactured on an orange acetate base that acts as a permanent colour cast; inverting it gives a washed blue image that no amount of intensity adjustment will fix, and the only real solution is to rebalance each channel independently after inverting — which is exactly what film mode does automatically by reading the histogram of your specific frame. Start from the preset that matches your goal, then fine-tune, and use the compare handle rather than your memory to judge whether the change actually helped.
- 1
Add your images
Drag them onto the card, click to browse, or paste straight from the clipboard with Ctrl+V. Multiple files are fine.
- 2
Pick a mode and tune
Choose full, per-channel, luminance or film, then adjust intensity. The compare handle wipes between before and after.
- 3
Invert and save
Press Invert, then download each file or take the whole batch as one ZIP. Change a setting and press Re-apply to try again.
The maths, in plain language
Why 255 minus v is a true negative
An 8-bit channel stores brightness as a whole number from 0 to 255. Subtracting each value from 255 maps the darkest possible value onto the brightest and vice versa, and because the mapping is a straight line every intermediate tone lands in a predictable place. That is why the operation is perfectly reversible: apply it twice and every pixel returns to where it started, provided you never save to a lossy format in between. It also explains why inversion never loses detail. It rearranges tones rather than discarding them, unlike a brightness or contrast change, which can push values past the ends of the range and clip them permanently.
Why scanned film needs more than an invert
Colour negative film is coated on an orange-tinted base that exists to correct the dyes during printing. Your scanner records that tint as part of the image, so after inversion it becomes a strong blue cast that sits on top of everything. Because the cast affects each channel by a different amount, no single white-balance slider removes it cleanly. Film mode measures where the real data starts and ends in each channel separately — ignoring the top and bottom 0.4% so a dust speck cannot skew the result — and stretches each one to fill the range. The cast disappears because red, green and blue are rescaled independently rather than moved together.
What people use it for
Digitising old negatives
Photograph a 35 mm strip on a light panel, crop the frame, and use film mode to recover a natural positive.
Dark-mode documents
Turn a bright white scan or screenshot into a dark version that is easy on the eyes at night without wrecking the colours.
Checking logo contrast
Designers invert a mockup to see instantly whether a mark still reads when the background flips from light to dark.
Line art clean-up
Pencil sketches photographed on white paper invert into glowing white lines on black, which is far easier to trace over.
Poster and album art
Partial intensity and single-channel inversion produce the washed duotone look that dominates modern gig posters.
Reading X-rays and scans
Medical and industrial images are often distributed as negatives; inverting makes structure much easier to see on screen.
Astrophotography
Inverting a star field turns faint white points into dark dots on white, which makes checking focus and tracking errors far easier.
Accessibility testing
Invert an interface screenshot to approximate how it behaves under a high-contrast or inverted display mode.
Six tips worth knowing
Export to PNG whenever you plan to invert again later. JPG re-compresses on every save and inversion makes those artefacts unusually visible.
Crop the black film edge and sprocket holes off a negative scan before using film mode. Those pure-black pixels drag the histogram and flatten the result.
For a dark-mode document, try luminance at 100% first. If the page still looks grey rather than black, the original scan probably has a beige paper tint — run it through greyscale first, then invert.
Single-channel inversion is the fastest way to generate a matching alternate colourway for a poster or thumbnail. Invert blue for warm, invert red for cool.
Intensity around 55 to 65% gives a flat, faded mid-grey image that works well as a background layer behind text.
If a batch of photos came from the same camera and lighting, set your options on the first one, then add the rest — identical settings are applied to every file in one pass.
Troubleshooting
The image will not load
The browser could not decode it. HEIC from an iPhone and some AVIF files fail outside Safari. Convert to JPG or PNG first, then invert.
Film mode looks too contrasty
The scan probably includes the black film border or a bright light leak. Crop to just the frame and try again, or drop intensity to about 90%.
Transparent areas turned white
You exported to JPG, which has no alpha channel. Switch the output to PNG or WebP, or choose a different fill colour in the JPG option.
The tab freezes on a huge photo
Very large images need a lot of memory for the pixel buffer. Close other tabs, process one file at a time, or resize the photo before inverting.
Frequently asked questions
How do I invert the colours of an image online?
Drop your picture on the tool card above, pick a mode (full negative is the default), and the preview updates instantly. Press Invert and save the result. Nothing is uploaded — the whole conversion runs inside your browser tab using the canvas API, so a 20 MB photo is processed as fast as your own device can do it.
Is inverting colours the same as making a negative?
For a digital picture, yes. A full RGB inversion replaces every channel value v with 255 − v, which is exactly the mathematical definition of a photographic negative. The difference appears with real film: a scanned film negative also carries an orange base mask, so a plain inversion of a scan looks flat and blue. That is what the Film negative mode is for.
What does Film negative mode actually do differently?
It inverts the image and then measures a histogram for each colour channel separately, finds the point where the darkest 0.4% and the brightest 0.4% of pixels sit, and stretches each channel to fill the full range. Removing the orange mask this way is what turns a muddy inverted scan into a natural-looking positive. A plain invert cannot do it because the mask is a colour cast, not a brightness problem.
Can I invert only one colour channel?
Yes. Choose Per-channel mode and switch red, green and blue on or off individually. Inverting just red pushes an image towards cyan; inverting just blue gives a warm amber cast. These are real duotone effects that most free invert tools do not offer at all.
What is luminance invert and when should I use it?
Luminance mode converts each pixel to HSL, flips only the lightness and keeps hue and saturation untouched. Dark areas become light and light areas become dark, but a red object stays red instead of turning cyan. It is the right choice for turning a white document scan into a dark-mode version that is still readable, or for previewing how artwork behaves on a dark background.
Does the intensity slider do anything useful, or is it just a gimmick?
It blends linearly between the original and the fully inverted result, so 50% lands exactly halfway. Low values wash an image towards flat grey, which is genuinely useful for background plates, overlay textures and faded poster effects. At 0% the output is pixel-identical to the input.
Are my images uploaded to a server?
No. Everything happens in your browser. Your file never leaves your device, there is no upload progress bar because there is no upload, and the tool keeps working if you go offline after the page has loaded. That matters if you are inverting medical scans, ID documents or anything else you would not paste into a random website.
Which file formats can I invert?
Anything your browser can decode: JPG, PNG, WebP, GIF (first frame), BMP, and AVIF or HEIC where the browser supports them. You can also choose the output format — keep the original, or force PNG, JPG or WebP.
Will transparency be preserved?
Yes when the output is PNG or WebP. The alpha channel is copied through untouched, so a transparent logo stays transparent and only the visible pixels are inverted. JPG has no alpha at all, so if you export to JPG the transparent areas are filled with the background colour you pick.
Can I invert several images at once?
Yes. Add as many as you like, set the options once, and every image is processed with the same settings. Download them individually or grab the whole batch as a single ZIP. The ZIP is built in your browser too, so batch download is not paywalled the way it is on most competing sites.
Why does my inverted JPG look slightly blocky?
Inverting exaggerates JPEG compression artefacts. Smooth mid-tones that hid the 8×8 block structure become high-contrast after inversion, so the blocks show. Exporting as PNG avoids adding a second round of compression on top, and starting from a higher-quality original helps more than any setting here.
Does inverting twice give me the original image back?
With a full RGB invert at 100% and a lossless output format, yes — it is mathematically exact. If you export to JPG in between, the second inversion returns the colours but not the lost detail, because JPEG discards information each time it saves.
Can I use this to read a scanned negative from an old camera?
Yes, and Film negative mode is built for exactly that. Scan or photograph the negative on a bright, even light source, crop away the film edge before inverting, and let the auto-levels do the colour correction. Results are good for family snaps and contact sheets. Serious archival scanning still benefits from dedicated software with per-film-stock profiles.
Is there a file size or resolution limit?
There is no limit imposed by us. The practical ceiling is your device memory, because the image is decoded into a full RGBA pixel buffer. A 50 megapixel photo needs roughly 200 MB of RAM while it is being processed. Desktop browsers handle that comfortably; older phones may struggle above about 30 megapixels.
Does inverting an image remove its EXIF data?
Yes. The canvas re-encodes the picture from raw pixels, so camera model, GPS coordinates, timestamps and any other metadata are dropped. That is a privacy win in most cases. If you want to strip metadata without changing the picture, use the remove EXIF tool instead.
Why does the preview look slightly different from the downloaded file?
The preview is drawn from a downscaled copy so it stays responsive while you drag the sliders. The download is always computed from the full-resolution original with the same maths, so it is sharper. The colours match; only the amount of visible detail differs.
Can I invert a GIF and keep it animated?
No. The canvas gives us the first frame only, so the result is a still image. Keeping animation would need frame-by-frame decoding and re-encoding, which we would rather build properly than ship badly. For now, convert the frames you need individually.
Does this tool add a watermark or need an account?
Neither. There is no watermark, no sign-up, no email wall and no daily limit. The output is your image with the maths applied and nothing else added.