Image Blur hides parts of a picture you do not want to share. Draw over a face, an address, an account number or a name, choose blur, pixelation or a solid block, and download the edited image. Everything happens inside your browser, so the unedited picture is never uploaded anywhere.
The screenshot you cannot quite send
Most redaction happens under mild time pressure. You are about to send a screenshot of a bank app to show a payment went through, and your balance is sitting at the top of it. You want to post a photo of a delivery problem, and the label carries your full address. You are sharing a class photograph, and not every parent has agreed to it appearing online.
The picture is fine apart from one rectangle. Covering that rectangle should not require opening an image editor, and it certainly should not require handing the unedited original to a website you have never used before.
How to blur part of an image
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Add the pictureDrop the photo or screenshot onto the page, or browse for it. It loads onto a canvas ready to work on.
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Mark what to hideDraw a selection over each area you want covered. Add as many as you need — a face here, a phone number there.
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Choose the effectBlur softens the area, pixelation breaks it into blocks, and a solid block covers it completely. The next section explains which to pick.
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Check it at full sizeZoom in on each covered area before you finish. A partly covered digit or a readable edge is the most common mistake.
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Download the edited copySave the new image. Your original stays on your device, unchanged, so you keep the full version if you need it.
Which effect to use
This is the one decision that matters, and the honest answer is not the one most tools give you.
Solid block — for anything that matters
Replaces the area with flat colour. Nothing of the original remains underneath, and nothing can be inferred from it. Use this for account numbers, identity document details, addresses and anything you would be troubled to see recovered.
Blur — for softening, not hiding
Smooths an area while leaving shape and colour visible. Good for backgrounds, faces in a crowd, or making something unobtrusive. Weaker than it looks when applied to text.
Pixelation — presentable, not secure
Breaks the area into visible blocks. It reads clearly as “deliberately hidden”, which is often useful, but it is the weakest of the three for short text.
Why we recommend the solid block. Blurring and pixelation both preserve some information from the original pixels — an averaged version of what was there. For a face in a photograph that is usually fine. For a short string of characters in a known font, such as a six-digit number or a name, researchers have shown that a determined attacker can sometimes work backwards from a pixelated or lightly blurred image and recover the text.
That is not a reason to panic about every blurred holiday photo. It is a good reason to use the solid block whenever the hidden content is a number, a name or an address. It costs you nothing and it removes the question entirely.
Why editing an image is safer than covering text in a document
There is a well-known failure that catches out even large organisations: drawing a black rectangle over text in a PDF or a word processor. The rectangle is a separate layer sitting on top, and the text underneath is still in the file. Anyone can select it, copy it out, or remove the shape.
Editing a picture does not work that way. When you apply a solid block here, the pixels themselves are replaced in the image you download. There is no layer to peel back and no hidden text underneath, because the image was never text to begin with. That is why converting a sensitive page to an image and redacting it there is a genuinely stronger approach than covering it in the document.
What people hide
- Screenshots for support. Showing an error or a transaction without exposing balances, email addresses or other conversations on screen.
- Faces. Children, bystanders and anyone who has not agreed to appear in a photo you are about to post.
- Addresses and labels. Delivery photos, parcels and documents that carry where you live.
- Numbers. Account, card and document numbers in a picture that is otherwise fine to share.
- Number plates. Vehicle photographs for a listing, a claim or a report.
- Work material. Client names or internal detail in a screenshot being shared publicly.
Your picture never leaves your device
This one deserves emphasis. Every image you bring to a redaction tool is, by definition, one containing something you do not want other people to see. Uploading the unedited version to a stranger’s server first would defeat the entire exercise.
This tool has no upload step. Your browser reads the picture from your own device, applies the effect locally, and hands back the edited copy. The unedited image is never transmitted to filecrafthub.com or to any third party, and no copy of it exists outside your machine.
Two things to check before you share
First, share the edited copy, not the original. Both files will be sitting in your downloads folder with similar names, and attaching the wrong one is the most common way a redaction fails in practice. Rename the edited version to something obvious before you send it.
Second, remember that a photograph can carry information outside the picture itself. Camera files often store metadata including the date, the device and sometimes the location where the photo was taken. Blurring the visible content does not address that. If a photograph’s location matters, take a screenshot of the image and share that instead, since screenshots do not carry the original camera data.
Frequently asked questions
Can a blurred area be recovered?
For short text in a known font, blur and pixelation can sometimes be attacked and partly reconstructed. Use the solid block for numbers, names and addresses, where nothing of the original remains.
Which option is the safest?
The solid block. It replaces the pixels entirely rather than transforming them, so there is nothing left to work backwards from.
Can I hide more than one area?
Yes. Mark as many regions as you need in the same image before downloading.
Is my image uploaded to a server?
No. The whole edit happens in your browser and the picture never leaves your device.
Is my original photo changed?
No. The tool produces a separate edited copy and leaves your original file untouched.
Can I undo the effect on the downloaded file?
No, and that is the point. The edit is applied to the pixels. Keep your original if you might need the full picture later.
Can I blur something in a PDF?
Convert the page with PDF to JPG first, redact it here, then rebuild it with JPG to PDF. This is genuinely safer than drawing a box over text inside a PDF.
Does it work on a phone?
Yes. Selection works with touch, so you can edit a screenshot on the device you took it on. Zoom in to check the result before sharing.
Related tools
Sometimes the better fix is to remove the area entirely rather than cover it — if the sensitive part is at the edge of the picture, Crop Image takes it out of the file altogether. To redact a document page, convert it with PDF to JPG, edit it here, then rebuild it using JPG to PDF.