Real tracing, not a bitmap in disguise
A large share of the "PNG to SVG converters" on the web cheat. They take your bitmap, encode it as base64, and paste it inside an SVG wrapper as an image element. The file extension changes; nothing else does. Zoom in and it pixelates exactly like the original PNG, because it still is the original PNG. This tool does the real work: it runs ImageTracer, an open source vectorization algorithm, directly in your browser. It analyzes the image, finds regions of similar color, and reconstructs their boundaries as actual path data, the same kind of curves a designer would draw by hand. The result is a genuine vector you can recolor, reshape and scale without limit. To rasterize a vector back the other way, SVG to PNG does the reverse, and JPG to SVG applies the same tracer to JPEG sources.
The classic rescue: a logo that only exists as a PNG
The most common reason people need this conversion is a lost original. The designer moved on, the agency folded, the source file lived on a dead laptop, and all that remains of the company logo is a PNG from the website header. Now a print shop, a sign maker or an embroidery service is asking for a vector file. Tracing is exactly the right tool for this: logos are usually flat shapes in a handful of colors, which is the case the algorithm handles best. The same goes for icons, silhouettes, stamps, and scanned line drawings. Feed in the cleanest, largest copy you can find, since sharper input edges produce more faithful paths. Once you have the vector, you can also generate every other asset from it, including a proper favicon via PNG to ICO or lighter web images via PNG to WebP.
Common questions
Is the output a real vector, or a bitmap wrapped in SVG?+−
A real vector. You can verify it yourself: open the downloaded file in a text editor and you will see path elements with coordinate data, not a giant base64 blob. Open it in Figma or Inkscape and every shape is selectable and editable. Scale it to poster size and the edges stay mathematically sharp, because they are curves, not pixels.
Can I vectorize a photograph?+−
You can, but be clear about what you get. Tracing works by grouping pixels into flat color regions, so a photo comes out posterized, like a screen print or paint-by-numbers artwork. That can be a deliberate stylistic effect, and some people use it exactly that way, but it will never be a crisp scalable copy of the photo. Fine gradients and tiny text degrade the same way.
Why was my large PNG downscaled before tracing?+−
Tracing cost grows with pixel count, and beyond a certain resolution the extra pixels stop improving the resulting paths while making the process dramatically slower. Large images are therefore reduced to a sensible tracing size, around 1024 pixels, before vectorization. For logos and icons this loses nothing that matters, since the traced output scales infinitely anyway.
Will my logo come out looking identical?+−
For flat-color logos, very close: solid regions and clean edges are exactly what the tracer handles best, and the vector version typically looks sharper than the source at large sizes. Smooth gradients get approximated as stepped bands of color, and very thin strokes or small lettering may need cleanup in a vector editor. Start from the largest, cleanest PNG you have.