How to Export Images in Photoshop – Day 28

Photoshop Export Settings: Every Edit Should Produce Two Files, Not One

Photoshop export settings are the part people rush, and getting them wrong is what quietly costs them work. The discipline is simple: a layered .psd you can go back into, and a flattened .jpeg you can send. One is the archive, one is the delivery, and they are not interchangeable.

Getting your Photoshop export settings right is what makes the second file look the way the first one did. Most of the ways an image goes wrong between your screen and someone else’s happen inside that one dialog box.

Why Two Files

The .psd Is Your Ability to Change Your Mind

Layers, masks, adjustment layers and Smart Objects all survive. Flatten to a JPEG and every one of those decisions is baked in permanently.

The .jpeg Is What Everyone Else Can Open

Small, universally viewable, and correct on any device once the colour profile is handled. Nobody wants a 400MB layered file emailed to them.

Saving Only One of Them Is the Mistake

Keep only the JPEG and the edit is over. Keep only the PSD and you have nothing to deliver. The two-file habit takes ten extra seconds and removes an entire category of regret.

Save the Layered File First

1. Go to File > Save As

   Cmd/Ctrl + Shift + S. Do this before you export anything — it’s the version you’ll want back.

2. Choose Photoshop From the Format Dropdown

   That’s the .psd. TIFF can also hold layers, but .psd is the standard and the most compatible option inside the Adobe ecosystem.

   

Export the Flattened Version

3. Go to File > Export > Export As

   Not Save As again. Export As is the dialog with the settings that matter, and for almost every delivery the format you want is JPEG.

   

4. Set the Quality Slider Between 5 and 7

   This is the fidelity-versus-file-size trade, and 5 to 7 is the range where the compression stops being visible but the file is still sensible. Pushing it to 10 usually buys you nothing you can see and a much larger file.

   

5. Set Width and Height for Where It’s Going

   A web image doesn’t need print dimensions. Export As will also generate several sizes at once — useful when the same shot has to go to a site, a social post and a client folder.

6. Tick Convert to sRGB and Embed Color Profile

   The two boxes that decide whether your colours survive the trip. Skip them and a carefully graded image can arrive dull or shifted on someone else’s screen — which is almost always what happened when an export “looks different” from the file you were editing.

Give the Output Its Own Folder

7. Click Export and Choose a Dedicated Export Folder

   Keep finished JPEGs separate from working PSDs. It sounds like housekeeping, but mixing them is how the wrong version gets sent — and the wrong version is always the one that goes out.

   

When JPEG Isn’t the Right Answer

JPEG covers most deliveries, but three cases are worth knowing before you commit your Photoshop export settings.

You Need Transparency

JPEG has no alpha channel — a transparent background will come out white. Export PNG instead.

The File Is Going to a Printer or a Client’s Retoucher

TIFF holds far more data and survives being re-saved without degrading. JPEG loses a little every time it’s written.

It’s a Graphic Rather Than a Photograph

Flat colour, type and hard edges compress badly as JPEG and produce visible fringing. PNG handles them cleanly.

Where Exports Go Wrong

Colours Shift on Someone Else’s Screen

Convert to sRGB was unticked. This is the single most common export complaint and it has one cause.

The File Is Enormous

Quality is at 10 and the pixel dimensions are still full-size. Drop to 6 and resize for the destination.

You Can’t Get Back Into the Edit

Only the JPEG was saved. There is no recovery from this — save the .psd first, every time.

The Wrong Version Got Delivered

Working files and finished files were sitting in the same folder. Separate them.

Using Save As for the JPEG

It works, but you lose the resizing, the multi-size export and the explicit colour controls. Export As exists for a reason.

Why Exporting Deserves a Whole Day

It looks like the least interesting thing in this series, and it is the one most likely to undo the other twenty-seven days. An image that was graded carefully and then exported without a colour profile arrives looking worse than one that was never graded at all.

The other reason is reversibility. Every technique in 30 Days of Photoshop has been built on non-destructive editing — Smart Objects, masks, adjustment layers, Apply Image instead of Flatten. Exporting is the moment all of that becomes permanent, and the layered save is what keeps it from being the end of the edit. Your Photoshop export settings are the last decision in the file; the .psd is what lets you take it back.

Export One Image Properly Today

Open your most recent edit. Save As, format Photoshop, into your working folder. Then File > Export > Export As, JPEG, quality 6, resize for wherever it’s actually going, tick Convert to sRGB and Embed Color Profile, and export into a separate folder. Download the free sample images if you want something to practise on. If you’re preparing files for print, our PRO course How to Master Sharpening in Photoshop covers output sharpening, which is the step that comes right before this one.

Quick Reference: Keys, Menus and Settings

• Save the layered fileFile > Save As (Cmd/Ctrl + Shift + S), Format: Photoshop
• Open Export AsFile > Export > Export As, Format: JPEG
• Quality5 or 6; check the preview at 100%
• SizeWidth and Height or Scale; Resample: Bicubic Automatic; Metadata: None
• Keep the colorsConvert to sRGB and Embed Color Profile, both checked
• Extra sizesPlus icon beside Size 1x, add 0.5x
• Where it goesExport into its own folder, separate from the PSD