BMP Format - ShareX Screenshot Output

BMP Format in ShareX

BMP (Bitmap) is an uncompressed image format that stores pixel data directly. It produces the largest file sizes but with zero quality loss and no compression artifacts.

Characteristics

• Uncompressed — Every pixel is stored directly, no data loss
• Very large files — A 1920x1080 BMP is approximately 6MB
• Fast to save/load — No compression or decompression overhead
• No transparency — BMP does not support alpha channels
• Simple format — Easy to parse for programming and processing

When to Use BMP

BMP is rarely the best choice for everyday use, but it has specific use cases:

• Raw image processing — When you need unmodified pixel data
• Legacy software — Some older applications only accept BMP
• Development/testing — Useful as an intermediate format in image processing pipelines
• Avoiding compression — When you absolutely cannot have any quality loss

Why Not BMP for Most Users

• PNG is lossless too — But with much smaller file sizes (often 10-20x smaller)
• No practical advantage — PNG gives you the same pixel-perfect quality with compression
• Wasteful — BMP files are unnecessarily large for screenshots

For most use cases, PNG is the superior lossless choice in ShareX.