Key Takeaways
- Dropbox isn’t just for storage—it’s also a surprisingly handy tool for quick photo editing.
- You can edit images directly on Dropbox browser with intuitive tools for brightness, contrast, cropping, and more, all while preserving original quality.
- Dropbox can save you time with seamless syncing and unexpected features like adding signatures or converting images to PDFs.
Dropbox is great for data backups, from preserving documents from your computer to pictures and files from your phone. However, there’s more to it than just being a cloud storage solution. Did you know that you could also edit photos on Dropbox?
Dropbox is a centralized, remote, and continuous way of saving data. I like to have the Dropbox app on my phone and save images, files, and photos on there, not just as a backup, but also to access it easily on my computer, either on the browser or the desktop app. As long as you’re connected to the Internet, you can sync all files and folders across devices, or choosing selective syncing allows you to choose which folders to store locally on your computer while keeping everything in the cloud.
Why Do I Use Dropbox to Edit Images?
Though many phones offer photo editing within the camera app, I have found that editing using Dropbox on the browser is a lot faster and more efficient overall, especially if you have multiple photos to edit. It’s less clunky than any other app and there’s no paywall to use their editing features.
Additionally, all the editing features are on one screen, so I don’t have to switch screens to change multiple things like you might do on a photo editing app on your smartphone.
Dropbox also supports photo editing for multiple file formats, including, JPEG, PNG, BMP, and PSD. When you edit and save images on Dropbox, the platform maintains the original quality without applying additional compression, so your images retain the same quality after editing.
Yes, Dropbox is no Photoshop or Lightroom, but if you need basic and quick photo edits without changing platforms, you might be pleasantly surprised. Its editing features are limited, but let’s go over the couple of options you do have.
How Do You Edit an Image with Dropbox?
To start editing an image, upload (or open) it to Dropbox, then click “Crop” or “Adjust.”
The photo editing features available include being able to change the brightness, contrast, highlight, shadow, and exposure. For color, you also have the option of increasing or decreasing saturation and temperature:
You can also flip the photo or rotate left or right, and crop an image manually or do a custom crop. It even allows you to crop an image for Facebook or Instagram dimensions.
When saving, you can “Save a Copy” (to preserve the original) or “Replace Original.”
Dropbox also allows you to add your signature or request one for your file, leave comments, and share images with a link.
Is There More to It?
There are also a couple of additional features that may not be immediately visible. To access them, save your current edits and then re-open the image again on Dropbox browser. You should see the option at the top to either “Self-sign” or “Send for Signature”. Click on either of these, and it will convert the image into a PDF, where you’ll be able to make further edits.
A window will appear prompting you to “Add Your Signature.” Close it. Now you should see additional options at the top to add more pages (or images) to the PDF. You can also see the option to Draw, Highlight, Add Text, Edit Text, and Sign the image:
Though Dropbox is lacking in advanced photo editing tools, after all, it is mainly a cloud storage solution. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t use it with other image editing tools. Dropbox is able to integrate with a ton of apps, including Canva, Pixlr Suite, WeVideo, CapCut, and more.
All you have to do is click on the image you want to open up in the image editing tool, click on the three-dot menu on the right, and navigate to Open In > Connect Apps.
Search for the app name or click “Connect”, and then “Allow”. You’ll be prompted to log in to your image editing app, and then it will connect to Dropbox.
Any changes you make using the third-party app to the file you’ve done this for will save back to Dropbox. Here’s my edited picture after doing this:
Note that the text towards the bottom of the above image was edited via Dropbox on the browser.
How Does Dropbox Syncing Work?
When you save files to your Dropbox folder on your computer, they are automatically synced to the Dropbox servers and other connected devices you use Dropbox on. Syncing is very efficient, since it uses a modified version of the rsync algorithm to only sync the changed portions of files, rather than re-uploading entire files. This approach allows Dropbox to handle large files and frequent updates without requiring complete file uploads, which saves saves bandwidth and improves synchronization speed.
If you have the Dropbox desktop app downloaded to your computer, the files will also be saved locally.
What About Editing Directly on the Mobile App vs. The Web?
To edit photos with the Dropbox mobile app, you can either open the image up in your photos app and edit from there, or edit directly on the Dropbox app. However, the editing features on the mobile app are extremely limited. You only have two editing options, to crop and to rotate.
I personally avoid the Dropbox mobile app for cropping or rotating images since my phone editor already allows me to do this quite quickly. If I’m just cropping an image or changing the brightness, I usually just use my phone editor. However, when looking at making multiple changes very quickly, I prefer Dropbox unless I want to do something major, then I may consider Photoshop.
Dropbox isn’t just a cloud storage tool—it’s a quick photo editor, too. It is nowhere close to the image editing tools available on the market today, but its image editing tool is free to use and very efficient when taking into consideration the automatic sync. Sure, it lacks advanced editing features, but for quick edits without the fuss, give it a shot. It might even save you some time.
