Old photo restoration, on your own device
OpenPixels is a free photo enhancer that runs in your browser. For old photo restoration it rebuilds faces that have gone soft, adds color to a black and white print, clears grain and enlarges a small scan, and the photo is never uploaded.
Free, no account, no watermark, and no limit on how many photos you process.
What old photo restoration does here.
Rebuild faces
Faces are found, rebuilt at 512 × 512 and pasted back through a feathered mask. A slider called How strongly sets how much of the rebuilt face is used, from 20% to 100%.
Add color
For a black and white print, Add colour gives it color. Only the color comes from the model; the photo keeps its own light and shade. How vivid sets how strong it is.
Clear grain
Noise and grain has three settings: Leave it, Reduce and Remove. It also clears the blocky edges that heavy compression leaves in an old scan.
Enlarge a small scan
2×, 4× or 8×, or Same size, just cleaner for a scan that is already large enough.
Old photo restoration in six steps, no sign-up.
- Scan or photograph the print, open the web app and press Choose a photo.
- Turn on Rebuild faces. Start How strongly lower if the face has to stay close to the original.
- If the photo is black and white, turn on Add colour. The app notices a black and white photo and suggests it.
- Under Noise and grain, choose Reduce, or Remove for a grainy scan.
- Under Size, pick 2× or 4× for a small scan, or Same size, just cleaner.
- Press Enhance, drag the slider to compare Original with Result, then press Save the photo.
For a whole box of prints, Several at once applies the same settings to every photo, one after another, and downloads them as a single ZIP. Old photo restoration on a hundred family prints costs nothing more than on one.
Only want color? The photo colorizer page covers adding color on its own.
Faces and color run in the browser.
Rebuilding faces and adding color run in the web app at openpixels.app and in the Chrome and Firefox extension. The Mac, Windows and Android apps enlarge photos and clear noise, but do not do these two yet, so for old photo restoration open the web app.
The first time, the face model (about 340 MB) and the color model (about 228 MB) download once, with a progress bar. After that, old photo restoration works with no network connection, and the photo never leaves your device.
What it will not do.
Old photo restoration here does not repair physical damage. There is no model for scratches, creases, stains, tears or missing corners, so those stay in the photo.
A rebuilt face is the model’s reconstruction, not a recovered original. It can look a little different from the person, most of all when the face in the scan is tiny or badly blurred. Lower How strongly to keep more of the original face.
The color is the model’s guess. It is plausible, not a record of what anyone wore. And nothing can invent detail that was never captured.
There is no server to pay for.
Tools that charge for this upload your photo and pay for the GPU that handles it. That server bill is what a subscription or a per-photo credit covers.
OpenPixels has no such bill. The AI models run inside your browser through WebAssembly and WebGPU, on your own processor, so there is nothing to charge you for.
Before you open it.
Is this old photo restoration free?
Yes, entirely. There is no paid tier, no account, no trial, no watermark, no credits and no limit on how many photos you restore. Your photo is processed by your own device, so there is no per-photo cost to pass on.
Can I restore old photos free without uploading them?
Yes. The photo is processed inside your browser tab and never leaves your device. There is no server in OpenPixels that accepts an image.
Can it remove scratches and creases from an old photo?
No. There is no model for scratches, creases, stains or tears. It rebuilds faces, adds color, clears grain and enlarges; physical damage stays as it is.
Will the restored face look exactly like the person?
Not always. The face is rebuilt by a model, so it can differ a little from the person, most of all when the face in the scan is tiny. Turn How strongly down to keep more of the original face.
Does AI photo restoration work in the desktop apps?
Rebuilding faces and adding color run in the web app and the Chrome and Firefox extension. The Mac, Windows and Android apps enlarge photos and clear noise, but do not do these two yet.
Do I need an account?
No. Every feature works with no account and no sign-in.
Restore an old photo now.
The app that does old photo restoration also enlarges a photo up to 8×, clears noise and JPEG artifacts and makes a background white, all on your own device. See what else it does.
Open OpenPixels →