What WhatsApp does to your photos
To keep chats light on mobile data, WhatsApp resizes and heavily re-compresses every photo sent the normal way — typically down to roughly 1200–1600 px at strong compression. Fine for memes; painful for a photographer's delivery, a document scan, or the one good shot from an event.
You have three ways to keep quality:
| Method | How | Result |
|---|---|---|
| HD quality | Tap "HD" when attaching (photo settings) | Higher resolution, still re-compressed |
| Send as document | Attach → Document → pick the photo | Zero re-compression — exact file delivered |
| Pre-compress here | Compress at 2048 px / q85, then send as document | Sharp AND small — best of both |
The pre-compress + document combo
Sending originals as documents works but pushes 5–10 MB per photo through everyone's data plans. The smarter flow: compress here first (this page presets 2048 px, quality 85 — visually clean at a few hundred KB), then send as a document so WhatsApp doesn't touch it. Recipients get sharp images that download instantly.
Batch tip: drop a whole event's photos here, download the ZIP, and share the ZIP itself as a document — one file, full control, no per-photo quality lottery.