Blur, Pixelate & Redact Image
Hide faces, plates, names and numbers — blur, pixelate or a solid box, on your device.
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Drag over an area (Shift: square)
Keyboard: Add box puts an area in the middle; the arrow keys move the selected area (Shift: faster) and Alt + arrow keys resize it.
Blur and pixelation are not always safe for text. Blurred or pixelated names, numbers and documents can sometimes be partly reconstructed. To hide them for certain, use Solid box. The saved image is re-encoded from new pixels, so the original’s EXIF data (including GPS location) is not included.
About the Blur, Pixelate & Redact Image
Hide what should not be shared before you post or send a picture: faces of bystanders and children, number plates, house numbers, addresses, names, card or account numbers, or anything on a screenshot. Draw rectangles, ellipses or brush strokes and choose Blur, Pixelate or a Solid box for each, or blur the whole image at once. Detect faces finds faces on your device (MediaPipe BlazeFace) and covers each with an ellipse you can adjust.
Blurred or pixelated text can sometimes be partly reconstructed, so for names, numbers and documents use Solid box: the saved picture then contains only the colour there. Every saved image is re-encoded from new pixels, so the original’s EXIF data — including GPS location — is removed. Nothing is uploaded.
How to use it
- Choose, drop or paste a photo or screenshot.
- Pick Blur, Pixelate or Solid box and a strength, then drag a Rectangle or Ellipse over each area, or paint with the Brush. Select Detect faces to cover faces automatically. Without a mouse, Add box puts an area in the middle: move it with the arrow keys and resize it with Alt + arrow keys.
- Click an area to move or resize it, or change its effect and strength; Delete removes it and Undo reverts any step.
- Choose the format and select Download (or Copy image).
Examples
Detect faces → 6 ellipses; remove the ones of your friends; strength 7
Strangers in the background are blurred; your friends stay visible
Solid box over the account number and name; blur over the balance
The number and name are completely covered; nothing of them is left in the file
Pixelate rectangle over the number plate, strength 8
A large-block mosaic where the plate was
Common uses
- Blurring bystanders, children or patients before posting photos.
- Covering account numbers, addresses and names on screenshots for support chats or bug reports.
- Pixelating number plates and house numbers in listings.
- Blurring a whole image to use as a soft background.
Blur, pixelate or solid box — which is safe?
- Solid box replaces the pixels with one colour. Nothing of what was underneath remains in the saved file. Use it for names, numbers, addresses, passwords, codes and documents.
- Pixelate averages the image in square blocks. Large blocks hide faces well, but pixelated text in a known font can sometimes be guessed back by trying candidates until one pixelates the same way.
- Blur smooths the area with a Gaussian blur. Strong blur hides faces and backgrounds; weak blur over small text can sometimes be reversed.
Strength is relative to the picture (a share of its shorter side), so a strength of 5 looks the same on a small screenshot and a large photo.
About face detection
Faces are found on your device with Google’s MediaPipe face detector and its BlazeFace short-range model (Apache License 2.0). The model is designed for faces that fill a good part of the picture — its model card describes faces whose boxes are at least 20% of the image size, within about 2 metres of the camera — so MySmartCoPilot also scans the photo in overlapping tiles to find smaller faces, and pads each box to cover hair and chin. Faces that are very small, turned away, tilted more than about 45°, or partly hidden are often missed, and it can occasionally mark something that is not a face. Always check the whole picture and draw over any face that was missed. The first use downloads the detector (about 11 MB) from this site; no picture is sent anywhere, and nothing about the faces is stored or recognised.
What is removed from the saved file
The saved image is drawn anew from the edited pixels and encoded by your browser, so it carries none of the original file’s metadata: no EXIF camera data, no date taken and no GPS location. Check any photo’s metadata with the image metadata viewer. Remember that other details in the picture — a street sign, a reflection, a uniform — can still reveal a place or a person.
Limitations
- Face detection can miss faces (small, side-on, tilted, covered) and occasionally mark other things; check the result yourself.
- Blur and pixelation are not a guarantee for text: use Solid box for anything sensitive.
- Images larger than about 33 megapixels are scaled down for editing and saving, to stay within browser memory.
- Areas cannot be rotated; use several areas or the brush for slanted shapes.
- Changes are kept only while the page is open: undo and redo work until you leave it.
Privacy
Everything happens in your browser. What you enter or open here is not uploaded or stored by MySmartCoPilot. Detect faces downloads the face detector (about 11 MB) from this site the first time you use it; drawing, blurring and saving need no download.
Frequently asked questions
Is my photo uploaded?
No. The photo is edited in your browser, and face detection runs on your device too. Nothing is sent to a server, and it works offline once the page (and, for faces, the detector) has loaded.
Can blurred or pixelated text be read again?
Sometimes, yes — especially short numbers in a common font with weak blur or small blocks. For anything sensitive, use Solid box, which leaves nothing of the original in the saved file.
How do I blur only the faces in a photo?
Select Detect faces. Each face found is covered with an ellipse you can move, resize or delete. Draw ellipses over any face that was missed.
Does it remove the GPS location?
Yes. The saved image is re-encoded from pixels, so it has no EXIF data at all — no GPS location, camera model or date taken.
Can I blur the background and keep the person sharp?
Select Whole image to blur everything, or paint the background with the Brush. This tool does not cut out people automatically.