---
name: "dwebp"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "libwebp"
version: "1.6.0-2"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/dwebp"
---

# dwebp(1)

decompress a WebP file to an image file

## NAME

dwebp - decompress a WebP file to an image file

## SYNOPSIS

**dwebp** \[*options*\] *input\_file.webp*\

## DESCRIPTION

This manual page documents the **dwebp** command.

**dwebp** decompresses WebP files into PNG, PAM, PPM or PGM images. Note: Animated WebP files are not supported.

## OPTIONS

The basic options are:

- **-h**

  Print usage summary.

- **-version**

  Print the version number (as major.minor.revision) and exit.

- **-o** *string*

  Specify the name of the output file (as PNG format by default). Using "-" as output name will direct output to 'stdout'.

- **--** *string*

  Explicitly specify the input file. This option is useful if the input file starts with an '-' for instance. This option must appear **last**. Any other options afterward will be ignored. If the input file is "-", the data will be read from *stdin* instead of a file.

- **-bmp**

  Change the output format to uncompressed BMP.

- **-tiff**

  Change the output format to uncompressed TIFF.

- **-pam**

  Change the output format to PAM (retains alpha).

- **-ppm**

  Change the output format to PPM (discards alpha).

- **-pgm**

  Change the output format to PGM. The output consists of luma/chroma samples instead of RGB, using the IMC4 layout. This option is mainly for verification and debugging purposes.

- **-yuv**

  Change the output format to raw YUV. The output consists of luma/chroma-U/chroma-V samples instead of RGB, saved sequentially as individual planes. This option is mainly for verification and debugging purposes.

- **-nofancy**

  Don't use the fancy upscaler for YUV420. This may lead to jaggy edges (especially the red ones), but should be faster.

- **-nofilter**

  Don't use the in-loop filtering process even if it is required by the bitstream. This may produce visible blocks on the non-compliant output, but it will make the decoding faster.

- **-dither** *strength*

  Specify a dithering **strength** between 0 and 100. Dithering is a post-processing effect applied to chroma components in lossy compression. It helps by smoothing gradients and avoiding banding artifacts.

- **-alpha\_dither**

  If the compressed file contains a transparency plane that was quantized during compression, this flag will allow dithering the reconstructed plane in order to generate smoother transparency gradients.

- **-nodither**

  Disable all dithering (default).

- **-mt**

  Use multi-threading for decoding, if possible.

- **-crop** *x\_position y\_position width height*

  Crop the decoded picture to a rectangle with top-left corner at coordinates (**x\_position**, **y\_position**) and size **width** x **height**. This cropping area must be fully contained within the source rectangle. The top-left corner will be snapped to even coordinates if needed. This option is meant to reduce the memory needed for cropping large images. Note: the cropping is applied *before* any scaling.

- **-flip**

  Flip decoded image vertically (can be useful for OpenGL textures for instance).

- **-resize**, **-scale** *width height*

  Rescale the decoded picture to dimension **width** x **height**. This option is mostly intended to reducing the memory needed to decode large images, when only a small version is needed (thumbnail, preview, etc.). Note: scaling is applied *after* cropping. If either (but not both) of the **width** or **height** parameters is 0, the value will be calculated preserving the aspect-ratio.

- **-quiet**

  Do not print anything.

- **-v**

  Print extra information (decoding time in particular).

- **-noasm**

  Disable all assembly optimizations.

## EXIT STATUS

If there were no problems during execution, **dwebp** exits with the value of the C constant **EXIT\_SUCCESS**. This is usually zero.

If an error occurs, **dwebp** exits with the value of the C constant **EXIT\_FAILURE**. This is usually one.

## EXAMPLES

dwebp picture.webp -o output.png\
 dwebp picture.webp -ppm -o output.ppm\
 dwebp -o output.ppm -- ---picture.webp\
 cat picture.webp \| dwebp -o - -- - \> output.ppm

## AUTHORS

**dwebp** is a part of libwebp and was written by the WebP team.\
 The latest source tree is available at https://chromium.googlesource.com/webm/libwebp

This manual page was written by Pascal Massimino \<pascal.massimino@gmail.com\>, for the Debian project (and may be used by others).

## REPORTING BUGS

Please report all bugs to the issue tracker: https://issues.webmproject.org\
 Patches welcome! See this page to get started: https://www.webmproject.org/code/contribute/submitting-patches/

## SEE ALSO

[**cwebp**(1)](/cwebp/1.md), [**gif2webp**(1)](/gif2webp/1.md), [**webpmux**(1)](/webpmux/1.md)\
 Please refer to https://developers.google.com/speed/webp/ for additional information.

### Output file format details

PAM: http://netpbm.sourceforge.net/doc/pam.html\
 PGM: http://netpbm.sourceforge.net/doc/pgm.html\
 PPM: http://netpbm.sourceforge.net/doc/ppm.html\
 PNG: http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/png-sitemap.html#info