About BMP Files
BMP Image
BMP is an uncompressed raster image format native to Windows. Files are large but preserve exact pixel data with no compression artifacts. Rarely used on the web due to file size.
Family
Raster & Vector Images
Extension
.bmp
MIME Type
image/bmp, image/x-ms-bmp
Can Use As
42 4D 50 46 00 01 00 00 4B 41 49 4A
ASCII: BMPF....KAIJ
📈 Target Minimum File Size (Guaranteed ≥ KB)
Lossless JPEG Q100 + standard COM segment padding for government & exam portals
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HOW BMP CAME TO BE.
BMP — short for Bitmap — is one of the oldest image formats still in everyday use. It shipped with Windows 1.0 in 1985 and with OS/2 shortly after. The design philosophy was "store pixels as pixels": no compression, no tricks, just a header describing dimensions and color depth followed by raw pixel data. That simplicity made it trivial for any Windows program to read or write a BMP in a few dozen lines of code.
For a while, BMP was everywhere. Windows wallpapers, clip art CD-ROMs, print-shop templates. Then JPEG and PNG arrived and BMP slowly retreated to technical niches: embedded systems with limited CPU, legacy Windows APIs, and educational programming exercises ("write a BMP parser" is still a CS101 assignment). Today .bmp is mostly a compatibility fallback, but its straightforwardness is why it refuses to die.
Technical Specifications
- MIME type
- image/bmp
- Extensions
- .bmp, .dib
- Compression
- None (typical); RLE 4/8 bit (rare)
- Color depths
- 1, 4, 8, 16, 24, 32 bits per pixel
- Byte order
- Little-endian
Typical Sizes & Weights
Small icon (32×32)
4 KB
Screenshot (1920×1080)
~6 MB
4K image (3840×2160)
~25 MB
Scanned A4 at 300 dpi
~25 MB
STRENGTHS & LIMITATIONS.
Strengths
- Dead-simple format — trivially easy to read and write.
- Lossless and uncompressed — perfect bit-exact pixel storage.
- Universally supported in Windows applications since 1985.
- Supports 1, 4, 8, 16, 24, and 32-bit color depths.
Limitations
- Enormous file sizes — no meaningful compression in typical use.
- Not a web format — browsers support it but nobody serves BMPs over HTTP.
- No metadata support (no EXIF, no ICC profile in practice).
- Multiple header versions mean "a BMP" is ambiguous — parsers must handle several variants.
CURIOSITIES & TRIVIA.
A blank 4K BMP file takes up about 25 MB — the same image as PNG is typically under 100 KB.
BMP pixel rows are padded to 4-byte boundaries, which confuses anyone writing their first parser.
The format stores pixels bottom-to-top by default, the opposite of most modern formats.
Windows has updated the BMP header 6 times (BITMAPCOREHEADER through BITMAPV5HEADER) — a readable file might use any of them.
MS Paint defaulted to saving as BMP until Windows 7 quietly switched it to PNG in 2009.
Specialized Utilities for .BMP Files
Compress Image to 20KB
Compress signature scans, stamp images, and ID photos to strictly ≤ 20 KB (20,000 bytes) for strict online exam and government application portals using binary-search JPEG quantization.
Compress Image to 50KB
Compress JPG, PNG, or WebP photos to strictly under 50 KB (50,000 bytes) for passport portals, university admissions, civil service forms, and KYC uploads without changing pixel dimensions.
Compress JPG to 100 KB
Upload a JPG and download a decodable JPG at or below 100,000 bytes. If the limit cannot be reached, no output is offered.
Crop Image & Photo Resizer
Crop and resize JPG, PNG, WEBP, and AVIF images to exact pixel dimensions, social media aspect ratios, or custom print DPI online for free.
Resize Image
Resize images to exact dimensions or scale by percentage. Lock aspect ratio to prevent distortion. Supports all common image formats.
PNG Compressor — Reduce PNG Size Preserving Transparency
Compress PNG images up to 80% while preserving full alpha-channel transparency, or lock exact file size targets (20 KB, 50 KB, 100 KB).
WEBP Compressor — Optimize WebP for Core Web Vitals
Compress WEBP images for ultra-fast page loads and Lighthouse scores with fine-grained quality sliders and exact byte targets.
Favicon Generator — Multi-Resolution .ICO from PNG, SVG or WEBP
Generate a production-ready multi-resolution favicon.ico containing 16x16, 32x32, 48x48, 64x64, 128x128, and 256x256 alpha layers from any logo.
EXIF Metadata Remover
Strip hidden GPS coordinates, camera serial numbers, timestamps, and XMP/IPTC metadata from JPG, PNG, WebP, and TIFF photos before sharing online.
Image to Text (OCR)
Extract text from images using optical character recognition. Supports photos of documents, screenshots, receipts, and handwritten notes in 100+ languages.
JPG to Word Converter (OCR)
Convert scanned JPG, PNG, and WEBP images into editable Microsoft Word (DOCX) documents using 12-language optical character recognition (OCR).
CONVERT FROM BMP
CONVERT TO BMP
Common Use Cases
Windows system graphics, legacy applications, lossless image storage.
Related Formats
Popular comparisons
BMP vs PNG
Differences, file size, and when to choose each format.
BMP vs TIFF
Differences, file size, and when to choose each format.
BMP vs ICO
Differences, file size, and when to choose each format.
BMP vs SVG
Differences, file size, and when to choose each format.
BMP vs PDF
Differences, file size, and when to choose each format.
BMP vs JPG
Differences, file size, and when to choose each format.
Popular BMP conversions
The most-requested destinations when starting from BMP.
Frequently Asked Questions
BMP (Bitmap) is a raster image format developed by Microsoft for Windows. It stores images with no compression by default, resulting in large file sizes but pixel-perfect quality. It has been part of Windows since version 1.0.
BMP files open in Windows Paint, Photos, macOS Preview, GIMP, Photoshop, and virtually any image viewer. All Windows applications support BMP natively.
PNG is better than BMP in almost every scenario since it provides lossless compression (smaller files), transparency support, and wider cross-platform use. BMP is mainly relevant for legacy Windows applications.
Yes. Every .bmp file uploaded to KaijuConverter is transferred over TLS 1.3, processed in an isolated container with SHA-256 verification, and automatically deleted within 30–60 minutes (or immediately with 1 click).
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