How to remove the background from a photo for free

You’ve got a photo and you only want part of it — the person, the product, the pet — without whatever’s behind them. That used to mean a slow manual cutout in an image editor. Now an AI model can do most of the work in seconds, and there’s a good chance a free way to do it is already on your phone or computer.

What “removing the background” actually does

Every removal tool is doing the same job: deciding, pixel by pixel, which parts of the image are the subject and which are background, then making the background transparent rather than deleting it. That transparency is stored as an alpha channel — a fourth channel alongside red, green and blue that says how see-through each pixel is. A JPG can’t hold that information at all, which is why the result comes back as a PNG, ready to sit on top of anything else. (More on that in JPG vs PNG.)

How to remove a background in your browser (no upload)

This works on any computer or phone with a modern browser, with nothing to install and no account.

1. Open Altto’s Background Remover and choose a JPG, PNG or WebP photo from your device (or drag it in).
2. Click Remove background. The first time you do this in a session, your browser downloads the AI model itself (roughly 40–80MB), so the first run takes longer than the ones after it.
3. Click Download PNG. You get a transparent-background image at your original photo’s resolution, with no watermark.

Why is this private? Most online background removers send your photo to their own servers to process it. Here the model runs inside the browser tab instead, so the only thing that travels over the internet is the model (fetched once from altto.co.uk itself, the way a page loads a font) — never your photo.

How to remove a background on iPhone

iPhones running iOS 16 or later (iPhone XS, XR and newer) can lift a subject out of a photo with no extra app:

1. Open the photo in the Photos app.
2. Touch and hold the subject until a glowing outline appears, then let go.
3. Choose Copy or Share (or Add Sticker), and paste or send the cutout wherever you need it.

It’s quick and works well on clear subjects, but you don’t get to choose what counts as the subject, and there’s no way to fine-tune the edge.

How to remove a background on a Mac

In recent versions of macOS, open the image in Preview and use the Remove Background option. Preview asks whether to convert the file; choose File → Duplicate first if you want to keep the original untouched. Save the result as a PNG to keep the transparency.

How to remove a background on Windows

Windows 11’s Paint app has a Remove background button in the Image section of the toolbar. Open the photo in Paint, click it, and the background disappears. Save with File → Save as → PNG picture — if you save as JPEG, the transparent area turns white.

How to remove a background in PowerPoint or Word

If the image is going into a slide or document anyway, Microsoft Office can do it in place. Select the picture, go to Picture Format → Remove Background, then use Mark Areas to Keep and Mark Areas to Remove to correct anything it got wrong, and click Keep Changes. It’s more manual than the AI tools above, but that manual control helps on tricky images.

Which method should you use?

Tips for a clean cutout

• One clear subject gives the model the least to guess at — one person or product works far more reliably than a cluttered group shot.
• A background that contrasts with the subject — in colour or brightness — gives a clean edge to find. A white product against a white wall is the hardest case there is.
• Sharp focus matters: motion blur softens exactly the boundary the model is trying to draw.
• Fine detail is the hardest part of any cutout — flyaway hair, fur, lace, bicycle spokes. Even a good result can lose a little of it, so zoom in and check the edge before you use it somewhere important.
• Start with the largest version of the photo you have. The output keeps your original resolution, so a bigger source gives a crisper cutout.

What to do with a transparent PNG

Drop it straight onto a slide in PowerPoint, Keynote or Google Slides — they all respect PNG transparency. For a product listing or profile picture that needs a plain background, place the PNG on a new white or coloured layer in any image editor and export. For a website, keep it transparent so there’s no visible box around the subject. And if you want to caption it, the Meme Generator takes PNGs too.

Common questions