Webcam Capture
Turn on your camera, take one photo at the size the camera delivers and save it as a PNG. The preview can be mirrored; the saved photo never is. How it works
Use the Webcam Capture
Mirror preview flips only what you see: the saved photo is never mirrored. The grid and the shape frame are drawn on the preview only; a shape other than the camera's own crops the centre of the picture when you take the photo.
About the Webcam Capture
The camera stays off until you press Start camera; one press of the shutter saves a PNG at the size your camera delivers, for example 1280 × 720, and turns the camera off again. The preview can be mirrored like a selfie camera, but the saved photo is never mirrored, so text held up to the camera reads the right way round in the file.
Camera frame size and the size of the saved photo
| Frame the camera delivers | Photo saved |
|---|---|
| 640 × 480 | 640 × 480 |
| 1280 × 720 | 1280 × 720 |
| 1920 × 1080 | 1920 × 1080 |
| 3840 × 2160 | 3840 × 2160 |
| 8000 × 6000 | 7302 × 5477 |
| 12000 × 3000 | 10000 × 2500 |
The photo keeps the camera's size up to 10,000 px on a side and 40 million pixels; a larger frame is scaled down with its shape kept.
Photo shape and the photo saved
| Photo shape | From a 640 × 480 camera | From a 1280 × 720 camera | From a 1920 × 1080 camera |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1:1 | 480 × 480 | 720 × 720 | 1080 × 1080 |
| 4:3 | 640 × 480 | 960 × 720 | 1440 × 1080 |
| 3:4 | 360 × 480 | 540 × 720 | 810 × 1080 |
| 16:9 | 640 × 360 | 1280 × 720 | 1920 × 1080 |
| 9:16 | 270 × 480 | 405 × 720 | 607 × 1080 |
The centred part of the frame with that shape is kept, rounded down to whole pixels; Camera shape keeps the whole frame.
Frequently asked questions
- How do I take a picture with my webcam on a computer?
- Press Start camera and allow access in the browser prompt, wait for the preview, then press the round shutter button. The photo replaces the preview with a line such as Photo: 1280 × 720 px, PNG, and Download saves it with a name from your device's clock, such as webcam-photo-2026-10-12-20-05-09.png.
- Why is my webcam photo the wrong way round?
- It is not: the preview is mirrored, like a selfie camera, while the photo is drawn straight from the camera frame. Turn Mirror preview off to see the preview the way the photo will look. Text held up to the camera reads correctly in the saved file.
- Does the webcam capture have a timer?
- Yes. Set Timer to 3 s or 10 s, then press the shutter: the seconds count down on the preview and the photo is taken at zero. While it counts, the shutter reads Cancel timer and pressing it stops the countdown without a photo. Off, the default, takes the photo at once.
- Can I choose the camera or the resolution?
- The camera, yes, when the browser lists more than one: a Switch camera button then appears and opens the next camera in the list, and Retake keeps the one you chose. The resolution, no: the page uses the frame size the camera delivers. Photo shape can crop the centre to 1:1, 4:3, 3:4, 16:9 or 9:16, so a 1280 × 720 frame saved as 1:1 is 720 × 720. There is no filter or video recording.
- Is the webcam photo uploaded?
- No. The frame is drawn on a canvas on this page and encoded as a PNG in the browser; it stays until you retake it or leave the page. Retake keeps the old photo until the new camera has opened, and a refused prompt gives it back.
- What does Stop camera do while the permission prompt is open?
- A page cannot close the browser's prompt. Stop camera ignores its answer: if you then allow access, the camera is turned off at once, and a photo you had already taken comes back.
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