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Why do images look blurry or change in iOS Photos or Discord?

Saving a small PNG to iOS Photos and sending images through apps such as Discord can change how your artwork looks. Save small PNGs to Files. If sharing still changes the image or GIF, send it in a ZIP archive as a fallback.

Small PNGs become blurry or gain a white background in iOS Photos​

When a small PNG is saved directly to the iPhone or iPad photo library, iOS may upscale it and add a white background, blurring the pixel edges and losing transparency.

Save the PNG to Files. After exporting from Resprite, choose Save to Files in the system share sheet, select a folder under On My iPhone / iPad or iCloud Drive, and save it there.

For display in Photos, you can also increase Magnification during export and save a separate, larger PNG. Keep the original-size PNG in Files. See Export artwork for magnification settings.

Images or GIFs change when shared through Discord or other chat apps​

Sending artwork as a photo or image through a social app may resize, compress, or convert it. Depending on the app and how you send it, this can blur pixel edges, turn a transparent background white, or turn an animated GIF into a still image.

First try sending the PNG or GIF as a file or attachment. If it still gets changed or cannot be sent, use the ZIP fallback below. The recipient downloads and extracts the archive, then uses the image inside it. For GIFs, open the extracted file in an app that plays GIF animation.

Fallback: save to Files, zip, then send as a file​

ZIP packaging is lossless. Sending the archive as a file keeps its PNGs and GIFs out of the chat app's image compression and conversion workflow.

  1. Export the PNG or GIF from Resprite and choose Save to Files in the share sheet.
  2. Open Files, go to the folder, and tap Select. On iPhone, Select is in the More (…) menu. Select one or more files.
  3. Tap More (…) → Compress to create a .zip archive in the same folder.
  4. Send that .zip through Discord or another sharing app as a file or attachment.
  5. Ask the recipient to download and extract the ZIP, then use the PNG or GIF inside. On iPhone or iPad, save the ZIP to Files and tap it to extract it.

Apple also provides instructions for creating and opening ZIP files on iPhone and iPad.