Step by step
- Open the photo in the tool above. A scan at 600 dpi or a sharp phone photo of the print works best.
- Leave Colourise ticked and set the Colour slider. Tick Scratches and Fading too if the print is damaged.
- Press Restore photo. The first time, the 135 MB colour model downloads; after that it takes seconds on a graphics card.
- Compare and download with the slider, then save the colour version.
Why colourised photos sometimes look wrong
Black-and-white film records only brightness. A red dress and a green dress of the same brightness look identical in the print, so the model chooses the colour that is most common for that kind of object. That's why skies are blue, trees green and skin natural, while a car or a coat can come out in a colour it never was. If the true colours matter, colour the important parts by hand afterwards, or say in the caption that the colour is a reconstruction.
Privacy
Your photo is opened, processed and saved by your browser on this page. It is not uploaded, stored or seen by anyone. The page downloads the model (135 MB) and the ONNX Runtime engine (about 7 MB compressed) from this site the first time and keeps them in your browser’s cache.
Credits and licences
- DDColor (Kang et al., ICCV 2023), piddnad/DDColor, Apache-2.0. The “tiny” model in a 135 MB fp16 ONNX export by edgetools (Apache-2.0).
- ONNX Runtime Web (MIT) runs the models in your browser.
- Sample photo: a fictional 1910s studio portrait made with an image generator, with scratches, dust and fading added by our own script. It shows no real person.
Questions people ask
How do I colorize a black and white photo for free?
Drop the photo into the tool on this page and press Restore photo. Colourising is switched on for black-and-white and sepia photos. It's free with no account or watermark, and the download is the same size as your photo (or twice the size if you tick Upscale).
Are the colours real?
No colouriser can know the real colours of a black-and-white photo; the information isn't in the picture. DDColor makes an educated guess from millions of colour photos it learned from. Skin, sky, foliage and wood are usually convincing; clothing, cars and painted surfaces often won't match what they really were.
Will it change the photo's detail?
No. The model only predicts colour. Your photo's own light and shade, at full resolution, is kept, and the colour is laid underneath it.
Can I make the colours softer?
Yes. The Colour slider goes from 40% to 130%. Old photos often look most natural a little under 100%.
Can I colorize a sepia or faded photo?
Yes. Sepia, cyanotype and other toned prints are treated as black and white. Tick Fading as well if the print has gone flat.
Is my photo uploaded anywhere?
No. The AI model is downloaded to your browser once and runs on your own computer or phone, on the graphics card when your browser supports WebGPU and on the CPU otherwise. Your photo never leaves your device, and once the model is cached the tool works offline.