Delete Background from Image
Delete the background from an image with this free online tool. A neural network finds the main subject, the rest becomes transparent, and you save a PNG or WebP, or a picture on a solid colour. It suits products, pets, logos and portraits. It runs on CPUs, not GPUs, so a picture takes seconds, and hair, fur and glass can stay rough.
- This is an AI cut-out, not a colour filter. A neural network (BiRefNet) finds the main subject. It runs on CPUs, not GPUs, so expect several seconds per picture, up to about a minute when the server is busy.
- Upload limit for the free web tool is 8 MB and 12 MP per picture, and 3 cut-outs per day per visitor without an account.
- Hair, fur, glass and thin parts can stay rough, and a busy picture can make the model choose the wrong subject. The tool does not retouch faces and does not remove watermarks.
Drop a picture here or choose it. One picture per cut-out, up to 8 MB and 12 MP. HEIC, SVG and camera RAW files are not read.
The background becomes transparent: PNG and WebP keep it, a JPEG could not. The result has the size of your picture.
Complete the human check to enable the button.
Result
Your picture will appear here.
Without an account: 3 cut-outs a day, up to 8 MB and 12 MP each. Signed in: up to 20 MB and 25 MP, paid with credits.
Retention: web-tool results are deleted after 10 minutes. API results are kept 1 day on the free plan and 7 days on Starter and Pro (30 days on Business and Scale). A record of each job (type, time, status and credits, not what you submitted) is kept for 30 days without an account, or while your account exists if you are signed in.
No account needed
Try it without an account: 3 cut-outs a day per visitor, pictures up to 8 MB and 12 MP. Sign in for more.
Runs on CPUs, not GPUs
A picture takes several seconds up to about a minute, and High is about twice as slow as Standard. The time limit is 60 seconds for Standard and 120 seconds for High.
Deleted automatically
Web tool results are removed after 10 minutes.
Privacy: what you submit is used only to make this file. It is deleted when the job ends, also from the job record, and the result is deleted after 10 minutes. See the privacy policy.
Do this from your code
The same cut-out from your own code: send the picture as the request body to the image jobs endpoint with op=image_remove_bg, poll the job and download the result. The examples use the settings you chose and your file name.
curl -X POST "https://api.aiipworld.com/v1/image-jobs?op=image_remove_bg&quality=standard" \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $AIIPWORLD_API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: image/png" \
--data-binary @photo.jpg
# returns {"job_id": "...", "status": "queued", "credits_reserved": 2}; then poll:
curl https://api.aiipworld.com/v1/jobs/JOB_ID -H "Authorization: Bearer $AIIPWORLD_API_KEY"Retention
Web-tool results are kept 10 minutes; free API results 1 day; Starter and Pro results 7 days; Business and Scale 30 days.
In one sentence
A free online tool that removes the background from a picture with an AI model (BiRefNet), so the main subject stays on a transparent background or a solid colour, saved as PNG or WebP.
Key facts
- Input: one PNG, JPG, WebP, AVIF, GIF (first frame), BMP or TIFF picture, up to 8 MB and 12 MP without an account (20 MB and 25 MP signed in), read by content; HEIC, SVG and camera RAW files are refused.
- A neural network (BiRefNet, open source, MIT licence) finds the main subject and the rest becomes transparent; the picture is scaled to 1024 x 1024 px for the model and the result is scaled back, so the result has the size of the original, or the size of the subject when you crop.
- Options: quality Standard (smaller model, faster, 2 credits) or High (full model, about twice as slow, 4 credits); save as PNG or WebP; a transparent background or a solid colour; crop to the subject. The time limit is 60 seconds for Standard and 120 seconds for High.
- It runs on CPUs, not GPUs; in our test on a development computer a small picture took about 6 seconds in total with Standard and 10 to 13 seconds with High, including loading the model, and results vary with the server and the queue.
- Hair, fur, glass and thin parts can stay rough; the model chooses the main subject by itself and cannot be told which object to keep; the tool does not retouch faces and does not remove watermarks.
- In our test a 600 x 400 px photo of a cup (456 KB) became a 293 KB PNG with 47.6% of the pixels kept, or a 26 KB WebP; a 512 x 512 px NASA portrait lost part of the helmet with Standard and kept it with High.
- Free without an account: 3 cut-outs per day per visitor, no watermark. Signed in, a cut-out costs 2 credits (Standard) or 4 credits (High), plus 1 credit for each started 5 MB of the result beyond the first 5 MB; a job that finds no subject is free and failed jobs are refunded (100 free credits every month).
- Files are deleted automatically: 10 minutes after conversion without an account, 1 day with a free account.
- Developers can run the same job with POST https://api.aiipworld.com/v1/image-jobs?op=image_remove_bg (the image as the request body, settings in the query string) and an API key (see the API docs page).
How it works
- Drop your picture into the box, or select it from your device. Check the preview, the file size and the size in pixels.
- Keep the Standard quality for products, pets, logos and clear portraits, or choose High if Standard cuts part of the subject.
- Choose a transparent background or a solid colour, the file type and whether to crop to the subject.
- Click "Remove background" and wait for the job. It takes several seconds, and High takes about twice as long as Standard.
- Check the result over the checkerboard, a white or a dark background, then save the PNG or WebP.
Example output
Original PNG, 600 x 400 px, 456 KB
Background removed: PNG, 600 x 400 px, 293 KB
How to delete the background from an image with this tool
Start with the picture you want to cut out. Drop it into the drop zone, and the tool shows a preview with the file size and the size in pixels. Accepted types are PNG, JPG, WebP, AVIF, GIF, BMP and TIFF. HEIC, SVG and camera RAW files are not read.
Click "Remove background" when your settings are ready. The picture is sent to our server, a neural network finds the main subject, and everything else becomes transparent. The result panel shows the picture over a checkerboard, which is how transparent areas look, and you can switch the preview to white or a dark background.
Your original file on your device is never changed. You can run the tool again with other settings to compare results.
What the AI cut-out does, and what it does not do
The tool uses BiRefNet, an open-source segmentation model, to find the main subject of a picture. Pixels the model is sure about stay, the rest become transparent, and the edge is soft where the model is unsure. After that, the colour of the edge pixels is taken from the nearby subject, so an old background does not leave a coloured fringe.
It works on one main subject. It does not let you choose which object to keep, it does not cut several subjects apart, and it cannot know what you meant. A busy picture can make it keep a shadow, a table or a second object, or cut away part of the subject.
In our test on a 512 x 512 px portrait from NASA, Standard cut away part of the helmet in the foreground, and 45.1% of the pixels were kept. High kept the helmet, and 53.4% of the pixels were kept. A picture of a cup on a wooden table came out clean with Standard. On a close-up of a cat, both Standard and High left a rough patch of fur near the neck.
Hair, fur, glass, smoke and thin parts such as wires and wheel spokes can stay rough. The tool does not retouch faces and does not make a picture sharper or bigger.
Standard or High quality
Standard uses a smaller model. It is faster, and it is the right choice for product photos, pets, logos and portraits with a clear subject. High uses the full model. It takes about twice as long and costs twice as many credits, and it does better when Standard cuts part of the subject, for example shiny or dark objects or cluttered scenes.
The time limit is 60 seconds for Standard and 120 seconds for High. The picture is first scaled to 1024 x 1024 px for the model, and the result is scaled back to your size, so the time hardly depends on the size of your picture. In our test, the same picture took about 19 seconds of processor time with Standard and about 47 seconds with High.
If a job stops at the time limit, it fails and no credits are taken. Try again, or use Standard.
Transparent PNG, WebP or a solid colour
With a transparent background you can save a PNG or a WebP. A JPEG cannot hold transparency, so the tool does not offer it. PNG is lossless and larger, WebP is much smaller. In our test, the same 600 x 400 px result was 293 KB as PNG and 26 KB as WebP.
Choose "A solid colour" to put the subject on a colour, for example white for a shop, and the picture is saved without transparency. Unless you crop to the subject, the result has the size of your picture.
A large picture gives a large PNG. In our test, a 25 megapixel photo gave a PNG of about 14 MB.
Crop to the subject
Tick "Crop to the subject" to cut the picture to the box around everything that is not transparent. In our test on the cup picture, the result was 405 x 375 px instead of 600 x 400 px.
The crop is made after the background is removed, so no pixel of the subject is lost. Leave it off if you need the original size, for example to put the subject back on the same place of a background.
Delete background from image or transparent background maker
Use this tool when the background is not one flat colour: a photo of a product on a table, a person in front of a room, a pet on a lawn. The model finds the subject, so it works on busy backgrounds.
Use the Transparent Background Maker when the background is one flat colour, such as a logo, an icon or a signature on white. It removes that colour and the colours close to it. It is not AI, so it follows the colour exactly and does not guess a subject; by default it removes the colour everywhere in the picture, and it has a setting to remove only the background that touches the edges.
A flat colour is the easy case for the Transparent Background Maker, and it can be more exact on a logo with sharp edges than an AI model. A photo is the easy case for this tool. If one does not work, try the other.
Removing photo backgrounds for products, portraits and pets
For a product photo, use an even background and a subject that does not touch the edge of the picture, then start with Standard. Shiny, transparent or dark objects are hard for the model, and High usually does better with them.
For a portrait, a clear outline helps. Loose hair on a similar colour is the hardest case, so check the edge at full size before you use the result.
For a pet, Standard usually works. Long whiskers and fur against a similar colour stay rough.
Always check the edges over a light and a dark background before you publish the result.
Limits: file size, pixels, time and free cut-outs
Each picture can be up to 8 MB and 12 MP in the free web tool, and up to 20 MB and 25 MP when you are signed in. A picture over the limits is refused before it is processed.
Without an account you can make 3 cut-outs per day. A refused request does not count. Signed in, a cut-out costs 2 credits for Standard and 4 for High, plus 1 credit for each further started 5 MB of the result beyond the first 5 MB. A cut-out that finds no subject is free, and a failed one is refunded.
The processing runs on CPUs, not on graphics cards, and only a few pictures are processed at a time. When many people use the tool, your job waits in a queue, so the time you see can be longer than the model time.
Delete backgrounds from code
Use the API when you want to cut out pictures in your own software. Send a POST request to https://api.aiipworld.com/v1/image-jobs?op=image_remove_bg with the raw picture bytes as the body, not JSON or multipart. Set the Content-Type to image/png, image/jpeg, image/webp, image/gif, image/avif, image/bmp or image/tiff.
Settings go in the query string, and unknown names are rejected. quality is standard or high, format is png or webp, background is transparent or a colour (write # as %23, for example %23ffffff) and crop is true or false. Send your API key in the Authorization header as Bearer, or in x-api-key. The response is 202 with a job_id. Poll GET /v1/jobs/:id until the job is done, then download the result from the short-lived download_url.
The tool page shows a ready cURL, Node and Python example below it, built from the settings you chose. Errors include 400 invalid_params, 400 unsupported_image, 413 file_too_large, 402 insufficient_credits and 429 rate limited. A finished job can also fail with image_too_large, corrupt_input, timeout or memory_limit; failed jobs are refunded. Full details are at /docs/#image-jobs.
Privacy: what happens to your picture
Your picture is sent to our server, where it is processed with the open-source BiRefNet model and sharp. The model runs on our own server, and the picture is not sent to an AI service of another company. Use only pictures you have the right to use, as set out in our Acceptable Use Policy. The tool does not remove watermarks, and it is not meant for that.
The uploaded picture is used only to make the result. The working copy is deleted as soon as the job ends, whether it succeeds or fails. The result in the free web tool is deleted after 10 minutes. Download links are short-lived. Camera and location tags are not written to the result.
A record of each job is kept. Signed-in users see their jobs in the dashboard.
Questions
How do I delete the background from an image for free?
Use the free web tool. Drop your picture into it and click "Remove background". No paid plan is needed. Anonymous use needs a human check, and you can make up to 3 cut-outs per day per visitor without an account.
Is this an AI background remover?
Yes. A neural network called BiRefNet finds the main subject and makes everything else transparent. It runs on CPUs on our own server. For a picture with one flat background colour, the Transparent Background Maker is the better tool.
What is the difference between Standard and High?
Standard uses a smaller model and is faster. High uses the full model, takes about twice as long and costs twice as many credits, and it does better with shiny or dark objects and cluttered scenes. The time limit is 60 seconds for Standard and 120 seconds for High.
Why does it take several seconds?
The model runs on CPUs, not on graphics cards. In our test on a development computer, a small picture took about 6 seconds in total with Standard and 10 to 13 seconds with High, including loading the model. The live server is a different machine, and a busy queue adds waiting time.
Can I remove the background and keep it transparent?
Yes. The default is a transparent background, saved as PNG or WebP. A JPEG cannot hold transparency, so the tool does not offer it.
Can it cut out hair?
It can follow clear hair outlines, but loose hair on a similar colour stays rough. Check the edge at full size, and try High if Standard cuts too much.
Why did it cut away part of my subject, or keep the wrong object?
The model chooses the main subject by itself, and a busy or low-contrast picture can fool it. Try High, or a picture with a clearer subject. The tool cannot be told which object to keep.
Can I remove a watermark?
No. The tool is for removing a background from pictures you have the right to use. It does not remove watermarks.
Does it retouch or restore faces?
No. It only separates the subject from the background. It does not retouch, sharpen or restore faces, and it does not recognise people.
What happens if no subject is found?
The job succeeds with an empty result, and the result panel says so. When you are signed in, no credits are taken.
Is my picture kept on your server?
The uploaded picture is deleted as soon as the job ends. The result is kept for 10 minutes in the free web tool, so you can download it, and then it is deleted.
Can I delete backgrounds in my own code?
Yes. Use the image_remove_bg operation of the image jobs API with the raw picture bytes. The tool page shows a ready cURL, Node and Python example for your settings.
Need this in your app or in bulk?
This tool runs on the same platform as the API, so the same image is one HTTP request from your code. A free account includes 100 credits a month.