To stop Word compressing images, turn on the “Do not compress images in file” setting and set the default resolution to “High fidelity” before you insert your pictures. Then pick the print-quality option when you save your PDF. Otherwise Word quietly reduces images to 220 ppi (pixels per inch), well below the 300 that sharp book printing needs.
- Why Does Word Compress Your Book’s Images?
- How Do You Turn Off Image Compression in Word on Windows?
- How Do You Turn Off Image Compression in Word for Mac?
- Which PDF Export Option Keeps Your Images Sharp?
- Does It Matter How You Add Images to Your Manuscript?
- How Do You Check Your PDF Before You Upload It?
- Frequently Asked Questions
Why Does Word Compress Your Book’s Images?
Microsoft Word shrinks the pictures in your document to keep file sizes small, and it does this without asking. The default target is 220 ppi: every image you insert can be reduced to 220 pixels per inch when the document is saved. That is fine for emailing a report. It is not fine for a print book, because print-on-demand printing is built around a minimum of 300 DPI. Amazon KDP’s image formatting guidance asks for all images to be inserted at a minimum resolution of 300 DPI, and treats anything under 200 DPI as low resolution.
A quick note on the jargon: ppi (pixels per inch) and DPI (dots per inch) are technically different things, but in book production they are used interchangeably. Both describe how much detail an image holds at the size it will print. You can calculate it yourself: divide the image’s pixel width by its printed width in inches. A 1200 × 1800 pixel photo printed at 4″ × 6″ works out to exactly 300 DPI.
Word can degrade an image at three separate points: when you add it (depending on how you add it), when you save the document (this is where the 220 ppi compression is applied), and when you export the PDF (where a low-quality setting can compress everything again). Each stage is controlled by a different setting, which is why fixing just one of them often isn’t enough.
The diagram above shows the practical effect: the same picture loses a little quality at each stage, and the loss is cumulative.
One thing this post is not about: images that were blurry before Word ever saw them. We covered that problem in why text inside your images prints blurry, where the culprit is a low-resolution original. This post is about the opposite case: your original was sharp, and Word degraded it. A pattern we see in Word manuscripts authors send us makes the difference easy to spot. When the original is at fault, one or two images look bad and the rest look fine. When Word’s compression is at fault, every image in the book has the same uniform softness.
How Do You Turn Off Image Compression in Word on Windows?
On Windows, the setting lives at File > Options > Advanced, under the “Image Size and Quality” heading. Microsoft’s instructions apply to Word 2016, 2019, 2021, and Microsoft 365, and the same settings appear in Word 2024. Three steps:
- Click File > Options, then click “Advanced”.
- Scroll to “Image Size and Quality”. In the dropdown next to the heading, choose the document you want to protect, or choose “All New Documents” to apply the setting to every future document.
- Tick “Do not compress images in file”, and set “Default resolution” to “High fidelity”.
“High fidelity” matters as much as the checkbox. It tells Word to keep pictures at their original resolution rather than resampling them down to a target like 220 ppi. The option exists in Word 2016 and every version since.
The detail most authors miss is the scope dropdown in step 2. The setting protects only the document selected there. If you leave it on the current document, the manuscript you start next month compresses images again with the same defaults. Choosing “All New Documents” fixes this once; note that it covers documents created after the change, not existing files, so older manuscripts still need the setting applied individually.
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How Do You Turn Off Image Compression in Word for Mac?
On a Mac, the same controls live in a different place: the Word menu (next to the Apple menu), then Preferences, then “Edit”. Many third-party guides point to the Save preferences instead; in current versions of Word for Mac that is wrong. We verified the path below in Word for Mac 16.109 on a Microsoft 365 subscription, and Microsoft’s resolution documentation confirms the same settings across Mac and Windows versions back to 2016.
- Open Word, then click Word > Preferences in the menu bar, then click “Edit”.
- Scroll to the “Image Size and Quality” section. In the dropdown, choose your open document or “All New Documents”.
- Tick “Do not compress images in file”, and change “Default resolution” from 220 ppi to “High fidelity”.
The Mac dropdown offers High fidelity, 330 ppi, 220 ppi, 150 ppi, and 96 ppi, with 220 ppi selected out of the box. Notice that even the highest numbered option, 330 ppi, still resamples your images; only “High fidelity” keeps them at their original resolution. The same pane also contains a setting worth knowing about: “Insert/paste pictures as”, which controls how Word places images in the text.
Which PDF Export Option Keeps Your Images Sharp?
The export step has its own quality choice, separate from everything above, and the labels differ between Windows and Mac. Getting this wrong can re-compress images you carefully protected.
On Windows, when you choose File > Save As (or File > Export > Create PDF/XPS) and pick PDF, look for the “Optimize for” choice. Microsoft’s PDF export documentation offers two options: “Standard (publishing online and printing)” and “Minimum size (publishing online)”. For a print book, always choose “Standard”. The “Minimum size” option shrinks the file mainly by reducing image quality.
On a Mac, choose File > Save As and set the File Format to PDF. You will see two radio buttons: “Best for electronic distribution and accessibility (uses Microsoft online service)” and “Best for printing”. The first one is pre-selected, which catches people out: for a print book PDF you need to actively switch to “Best for printing”, which exports the file locally on your Mac. This is a default worth double-checking every single time you export.
Avoid routing a book interior through a virtual printer (the “Print to PDF” style options) as your final export. Printer-driver routes vary in how they handle images, and the Save As route with the right quality option is the dependable, supported path on both platforms.
Does It Matter How You Add Images to Your Manuscript?
Yes, and it matters more than most authors expect. KDP’s image guidance is explicit on this point: insert images using Insert > Pictures, at their original size, rather than cutting and pasting them in. Pasting sends the picture through the clipboard, which can re-encode it or hand Word a lower-quality copy of the original file. Inserting from the file keeps the original data intact.
The most common version of this problem in manuscripts we receive is a photo pasted from an email or a web page. That image was usually downsized before Word ever touched it; email apps and websites compress aggressively. Word’s own compression then runs on top, and the result prints as a smudge. The fix is always the same: go back to the original file (the camera export, the scan, the file your designer supplied) and use Insert > Pictures. The ebook edition suffers from pasted images in the same way; we’ve covered why images look blurry in Kindle ebooks separately.
Two related habits protect you further. First, never enlarge an image after placing it; stretching a picture beyond its natural size lowers its effective DPI, since the same pixels now cover more inches. Second, leave “Discard editing data” unticked in the same Image Size and Quality section. When that option is on, Word permanently deletes the cropped-away parts of your pictures when you save, so you can never un-crop them later.
How Do You Check Your PDF Before You Upload It?
Check the exported PDF yourself before uploading it anywhere; do not trust how the images looked inside Word. Open the PDF in any viewer, set the zoom to 100% (actual size), and look closely at each image. At 100% zoom you are seeing roughly what the printed page will show. Soft edges, visible blocks, or smudged detail at that zoom level will be at least as visible in ink.
A file-size sanity check is a useful second signal, in our experience reviewing author PDFs: a photo-heavy book interior that exports to under 1 MB has almost certainly been compressed somewhere, because protected full-resolution images make PDFs noticeably larger. A suspiciously small file is your cue to re-check the three settings covered above before uploading.
The platforms will also tell you, in their own ways. KDP’s previewer flags image quality issues during upload review, and ordering a printed proof copy remains the only test that shows you real ink on real paper. IngramSpark’s file requirements ask for 300 ppi images (600 ppi for pure black-and-white line art), and its file creation guide sets hard floors: color-interior images under 72 ppi are rejected, and cover images under 200 ppi may be rejected. If you want the full specification picture, we’ve covered what DPI interior book images need for print-on-demand separately; the short version is that 300 DPI at the printed size is the standard across platforms.
To wrap up: turn on “Do not compress images in file” and “High fidelity” before you place your images, insert pictures from files rather than pasting them, choose the print-quality PDF option for your platform, and inspect the result at 100% zoom. Each setting closes a different gap, and together they ensure the images that come off the press look like the ones you started with.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do images look blurry on a PDF printout from Word?
Word compresses images to 220 ppi by default when a document is saved, and the PDF export can compress them again if a low-quality option is selected. Either step can leave images that looked sharp on screen printing soft. Turning off compression and exporting with the print-quality option prevents both.
What resolution does Word compress images to by default?
Word’s default resolution setting is 220 ppi on both Windows and Mac. Other available targets include 330, 150, and 96 ppi, plus “High fidelity”, which is the only option that keeps images at their original resolution instead of resampling them.
Does “Do not compress images in file” fix images that are already blurry?
No. The setting only prevents future compression; it cannot restore detail that Word has already discarded. After turning it on, delete the affected images and re-insert them from the original files using Insert > Pictures.
Will KDP or IngramSpark reject images below 300 DPI?
Amazon KDP recommends a minimum of 300 DPI, classes images under 200 DPI as low resolution, and flags quality issues during upload review, though it generally still processes the file. IngramSpark recommends 300 ppi (600 ppi for black-and-white line art); its checks reject color-interior images below 72 ppi, and cover images below 200 ppi may be rejected.
Does Word compress images in ebooks as well as print books?
Yes. The compression happens inside the .docx file itself, so any EPUB or Kindle file converted from that document inherits the reduced images. Ebook retailers then apply their own processing on top, which is why fixing compression at the Word stage helps both editions.
