Absolutely no one likes to be told that their go-to method for saving their images is wrong. For years, I have saved my artwork as PNGs (for those not hip to the lingo, 'PNG' stands for Portable Network Graphics). It was not until recently that I've been saving some of my artwork as both PNG and SVG files. But while I was stuck in PNG-mode, I fell in love with the file format. With its lossless data compression and cool-sounding file extension, I swore by PNG for many years. A majority of the artwork I have on this site is PNG. But while there's nothing wrong with a PNG, I realized that there were some limitations with the file format. After reading other graphic design and doing a search on the differences between PNGs and SVGs (Scalable Vector Graphic), I began to reevaluate PNGs as an option. It's not that PNGs are bad, but there are certain limitations to them.

The Pros of PNGs

First, let's look at the pros. PNGs are extremely helpful file types. If you're a digital artist, PNGs are a go-to. PNGs offer data preservation all while remaining at (usually) smaller file sizes. And because of their relatively small size, a PNG can easily be shared with others via email, text, or social media. If you're a web designer, PNGs are the best of both worlds. Not only are PNGs higher in quality than JPEGs, but they can be small in size. Typically, one PNG is anywhere between 1-5 megabytes, which is a major benefit if you're looking at storage and space. PNGs are also versatile, which means they can be opened anywhere on any OS platform -- whether that be Apple, Windows, Android, iOS, or Linux.

The Cons of PNGs

Sadly, nothing is perfect. While PNGs are an excellent file format to save and share images, it makes for a terrible marketing file type. In an overly-observant world plagued with billboards and jumbotrons, a logo must remain sharp and suitable for print and electronic reproduction. This is where PNGs fall flat. PNGs are lossless, but they certainly are not scalable (which is something I've learned over the years). That is, a PNG might work for a website, web page, or paper handout, but will not work on something huge (think the Times Square electronic billboards). For maximum quality, PNGs must be constrained to the pixel size that it is. For instance, if a PNG design is 300 x 300 pixels, it's going to have to stay at 300 x 300. Resizing the images past 300 pixels would mean the image loses quality (it becomes blurry and pixelated). If you're the graphic designer for a company trying to get their name out on a billboard, the last thing they want to see is a pixilated or distorted image of what was supposed to be their logo. This is where SVGs come into play.

To illustrate where a PNG falls sort, I've created a logo (the original image) and saved it in two different file formats: as a PNG and as a SVG. Now, the original image is 1080 x 1083 pixels, which is the size of both the PNG and the SVG. Then, I blew the two images up by about five time their original size (5760 x 5743.68 px) to see what would happen. The result? PNG 0, SVG 1. The top image is a PNG, which can be seen to be a little blurry and fuzzy. Notice the pixelated edge between the dark and lighter blue? That's because I resized a PNG more than its optimum constraints (1080 x 1083 px). The image below the PNG is the SVG result, which as you can see preserves the sharpness of the original image. An SVG can be blown up to virtually any size, whereas a PNG cannot. This makes sense, since SVGs are scalable vector images and PNGs are portable network images.

PNGs are also a terrible choice for web designers dealing with multiple images on a page. While a few PNGs on a page work well, a whole plethora of PNGs tend to slow down the loading of a page by a lot. Unless you have ultra-fast internet, having 20 or 30 PNGs on a page will cause it to slow down or even crash. Imagine if Amazon or eBay had high-quality PNGs instead of JPEGs -- you would be waiting a long time to get to where you needed to go.

So, in essence, PNGs are extremely helpful and have so many benefits attached. Not only are they high in quality, but they are also portable and lossless. And, PNGs can be shared to other people easily. But, PNGs have their limitations and, dare I say, their weak spots. PNGs are not suitable for massive media advertisements, and they can clog up web traffic if there is too many of them on one page.