View an image histogram
See how the light and colour in your photo are spread out, and whether anything is clipped.
- Free
- Runs on your device
- No account
- No limits
How to view an image histogram
- Drop an image in the box above.
- Read the shape. Bars piled at the left mean crushed shadows, and at the right mean blown highlights.
- Switch between brightness and the separate colour channels.
How to read a histogram
The width is brightness, from black on the left to white on the right, and the height is how many pixels sit at that brightness. A photo using its whole range has bars across the middle rather than a spike at one end.
Bars jammed against either edge mean detail has been lost there and no editing will bring it back. That's worth knowing before you start adjusting.
Like everything on this site, this tool runs in your browser. Your image is never uploaded.
Common questions
Is the histogram tool free?
Yes, properly free. No paid tier, no trial, no watermark on the result and nothing to sign up for. Put as many files through it as you like, as often as you like.
Are my files uploaded to a server?
No. The histogram tool runs inside your browser, on your own machine, so your files never go anywhere. Big ones are fine too, up to whatever your browser can hold.
How do I read a histogram?
It's a count of how many pixels sit at each level of brightness, dark on the left and light on the right, with height showing how many. A photo with most of its bars in the middle is evenly exposed. Bars bunched to the left mean a dark picture, and bunched to the right mean a bright one. There's no correct shape, only the one that suits the picture.
What does clipping mean?
A spike hard against either end. On the left it means areas that are pure black with no detail left in them, and on the right pure white. Clipped pixels hold no information at all, so no amount of brightening or darkening later will recover anything from them. A little clipping is normal, a large spike means the exposure was off.
What people usually do next
- Adjust brightness, contrast and saturation Brightness, contrast and saturation with a live preview.
- Pick colours from an image Click for hex, RGB and HSL, plus the dominant palette.