Blur Image

What this tool does

Blur image areas here without installing an editor or creating an account. Drag a box over a face, a number plate, a notification or a line of text and it is blurred, pixelated or blacked out in the preview straight away. Mark as many areas as you need, switch to Everything else to blur the background and keep your subject sharp, or blur the whole picture to use behind a headline. The download keeps your image at its original size.

How to blur part of an image

1. Add the image. Drop it onto the page, paste it, or choose it from your disk.
2. Mark the area. Drag across the part to hide. Drag inside a box to move it, or press Add area and use the arrow keys, with Shift to resize.
3. Pick the effect. Blur for a soft, natural look, Pixelate for a censored look, or Black box to remove the detail entirely. Raise the strength until the detail is gone.
4. Download as JPG, PNG or WebP.

Blur, pixelate or black box

Blur is the right choice for a background or a passer-by, where you only want the eye to move on. It is the weakest choice for text: a light blur over large lettering can leave it guessable. For names, phone numbers, addresses and plates, use a high-strength pixelate or a black box, and check the preview at full size before you download.

Why it works without uploading

Many of the blur tools that rank for this job send your photo to a server, put the download behind a signup, or lean on automatic detection that you then have to correct. Here the image is read by your browser and edited on a canvas on your device, so an unblurred original never leaves it. The file you download is re-encoded from that canvas, so it carries none of the original's embedded metadata either.

YouTube Studio can blur faces and objects in the video itself, as the guide to editing a video after uploading explains, but not in the thumbnail, so that pass is yours to do before upload. The car thumbnails guide covers where plates and house numbers slip in. To check that a blurred background still lets your subject read at feed size, use the thumbnail preview, or generate a thumbnail from scratch.

Last updated October 27, 2026.