What Is HEIC, and Why Won't Anything Open It?
Since iOS 11, iPhones save photos as HEIC (High Efficiency Image Container) — Apple's implementation of the HEIF standard. The format is genuinely excellent, storing photos at roughly half the size of equivalent JPGs. The problem is everything outside the Apple ecosystem: Windows needs paid codecs, many Android devices can't display it, most websites' upload forms reject it, and older software has never heard of it.
Converting HEIC to JPG is the universal fix — and this tool does it in your browser, which matters more than usual here: these are your personal photos, and with this converter they never touch a server.
How the In-Browser Conversion Works
On first use, the tool loads a compact open-source HEIC decoding engine (about 1 MB, cached for future visits). Each photo is then decoded on your device and re-encoded as a JPG at your chosen quality — 90% by default, which is visually indistinguishable from the source.
Stop the Problem at the Source (Optional)
If you'd rather your iPhone just shot JPGs: Settings → Camera → Formats → Most Compatible. The trade-off is larger files on your phone — HEIC really is about twice as efficient, which is why many people keep HEIC on the phone and convert on demand with this tool.
After Converting
JPGs too large for a form? Chain into the JPG compressor or the compress-to-50KB tool. Building for the web? Consider JPG to WebP for the final deployment format.