Frequently Asked Questions
What the tools do, what they do not do, and how your data is handled.
General
What is DesignKit?
A collection of seven browser-based utilities for color and image work: a color converter, palette generator, gradient editor, WCAG contrast checker, image compressor, image cropper and format converter. There is no backend — every calculation runs in the page you are looking at.
Do I need an account, and is there a paid tier?
No account, no paid tier, no usage quota. There is nothing to sign up for and nothing to unlock. The tools are the entire product.
Can I use the output commercially?
Yes. Colors, palettes, gradients and processed images produced here are yours to use, including in commercial work. We claim no rights over anything you create or upload, because we never receive it in the first place.
Which browsers are supported?
Current versions of Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari. The image tools depend on the HTML5 Canvas API and the File API, both of which have been standard for years. Very old browsers may load the interface but fail when exporting.
Does it work on mobile?
Yes, the layout adapts to small screens. The practical limits on mobile are memory and file picker behavior — very large photos may fail to process on older phones, and some mobile browsers restrict how downloads are saved.
Privacy and Data
Are my images uploaded anywhere?
No. Images are read with the browser's File API and processed on a canvas in memory. No request carrying image data is ever made, which you can verify yourself by opening the network panel in your browser's developer tools while compressing a file.
What happens to my files after I close the tab?
They are gone. Nothing is written to storage, no cache of your images is kept, and reloading the page clears everything. If you want to keep a result, download it before leaving.
Is image metadata such as GPS location removed?
Yes, as a side effect of how processing works. Decoding an image to a canvas and re-encoding it produces a file containing pixels only, so EXIF — including GPS coordinates, timestamps and camera serial numbers — does not survive. Note this also drops orientation flags and color profiles.
Do you use analytics or tracking cookies?
See the Privacy Policy for the current, authoritative answer. The processing itself requires no cookies and no identifiers of any kind.
Color Tools
How accurate are the color conversions?
HEX, RGB, HSL and HSV conversions are exact — they are different notations for the same sRGB values, computed with the colord library. CMYK is the exception and is approximate by nature, since a real conversion depends on the printer, the ink, the paper and an ICC profile.
Why does my CMYK value differ from the one my print shop uses?
Because there is no single correct conversion. On-screen CMYK is a rough estimate; production values come from a device profile. Treat the number here as a starting point and send the print shop an sRGB file plus their requested profile rather than raw CMYK.
How are the palette schemes calculated?
By rotating hue in HSL space. Complementary is the base hue plus 180 degrees, analogous is plus and minus 30, triadic is 120 degree steps, tetradic is 90 degree steps, and monochromatic holds hue fixed while varying lightness.
Which WCAG level should I target?
AA is the common legal and practical baseline: 4.5:1 for normal text, 3:1 for large text and for user interface components such as borders and focus rings. AAA raises normal text to 7:1 and is usually reserved for content where readability is the whole product.
Can I export a palette or gradient?
The palette generator exports a PNG swatch sheet with the hex values printed on it. The gradient editor produces a CSS declaration you can copy directly. Individual colors can be copied in any supported format from the converter.
Image Tools
Is there a file size limit?
The compressor accepts files up to roughly 10 MB and caps dimensions at 4096 pixels. The real constraint is device memory: a canvas holds the full uncompressed bitmap, so a 50-megapixel photo needs several hundred megabytes of RAM regardless of how small the compressed file is.
Why did compressing my image barely reduce its size?
Compression exploits similarity between neighboring pixels, so the result depends entirely on content. Screenshots and flat graphics shrink dramatically; foliage, fabric texture and film grain barely compress at all. An image that was already compressed once has little redundancy left to remove.
Does the cropper support freeform pixel-precise crops?
It crops to preset aspect ratios — 1:1, 4:3, 16:9, 3:2 and 2:3 — taking the largest centered region of that ratio, and it can rotate in 90 degree steps and flip on either axis. Arbitrary pixel rectangles are not currently supported.
Will converting to JPEG keep my transparent background?
No, JPEG has no alpha channel. Transparent pixels are composited onto a white background during conversion. If you need transparency, convert to WebP or stay with PNG.
Which format should I export?
WebP for almost everything on the web — lossy for photographs, lossless for screenshots and flat graphics. Use JPEG when maximum compatibility outside the browser matters, and PNG when you need lossless output with transparency and cannot use WebP.
Troubleshooting
My download did nothing. What happened?
Usually a blocked download or a browser extension intercepting the generated file. Check whether your browser is asking for permission, try a private window with extensions disabled, and confirm the image finished processing before you clicked download.
The copy button says it worked but nothing was copied.
Clipboard access requires a secure context. Over plain HTTP, or in some embedded browser views, the copy silently fails. Open the site over HTTPS in a normal browser tab.
My portrait photo came out rotated after processing.
Some cameras store the image sideways with an EXIF orientation flag telling viewers to rotate it. Because processing strips metadata, that flag disappears. Rotate the result with the cropper, or rotate the original before importing it.
Colors look different after converting an image.
The source file probably carried a wide-gamut ICC profile such as Adobe RGB. Re-encoding drops the profile, and the numbers are then interpreted as sRGB, which reads as desaturated. Convert to sRGB in your editor before processing.
The page froze while processing a large file.
Canvas operations on very large images are memory-intensive and can block the tab. Reduce the image dimensions first, close other heavy tabs, and prefer a desktop browser for files over a few megapixels.
Question not answered here?
Each tool page has its own FAQ covering details specific to that tool, and the blog goes deeper on color theory, accessibility and image formats. For anything else, get in touch.
See also the Privacy Policy and Terms of Service.
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