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DNG converter

A .dng file is Adobe's Digital Negative, an openly documented camera RAW format intended to outlive the dozens of proprietary vendor formats. It holds unprocessed (or minimally processed) sensor data plus everything needed to interpret it, and cameras from Leica, Ricoh Pentax, and most Android phones write it natively.

Private for supported formats — processed in your browser

Convert supported files

Runs on your device

Drop DNG files here

Batch files can each use a different output. Nothing uploads for local conversions.

Working inputs include camera RAW, browser-local audio/video, PDF, CBZ/CBR comics, office documents, ebooks, markup, 3D models, structured text, images, and archives.

Where DNG comes from

Adobe published DNG in 2004, building it on the TIFF/EP standard, and offered the specification royalty-free to encourage adoption as an archival raw standard. The spec has kept evolving — version 1.7 in 2023 added JPEG XL-based compression — and Adobe ships a free converter that migrates any supported vendor RAW into DNG.

How DNG works

  • TIFF/EP-based structure storing mosaiced sensor data, typically 12-16 bits per photosite
  • Embeds the color calibration matrices and opcode lists a converter needs to render the image without vendor secrets
  • Supports lossless JPEG compression of raw data, an optional lossy mode, and JPEG XL compression as of DNG 1.7
  • Can embed the entire original proprietary RAW file for belt-and-suspenders archiving
  • Includes MD5 checksums for validating raw data integrity over time

When to use DNG

  • Long-term archiving of camera RAW libraries in a documented format
  • Native capture on Leica and Pentax bodies and on Android phones via the Camera2 API
  • Unifying multi-vendor RAW collections into a single processing pipeline
  • Sharing raw files with collaborators whose software lacks a niche vendor codec

Strengths and limitations

Strengths

  • Open, published specification with a free conversion path from nearly every vendor RAW
  • Self-contained color calibration data reduces dependence on any one vendor's software
  • Built-in integrity checksums and optional original-file embedding suit archival use

Limitations

  • Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Fujifilm still refuse to write it in-camera, so most files require a conversion step
  • Converting can strip proprietary MakerNote fields some vendor software depends on
  • Like all RAW, files are large and need development before general-purpose use

Compatibility

Adobe applications, Capture One, darktable, RawTherapee, and Apple's and Microsoft's OS raw engines all read DNG, giving it the broadest software reach of any RAW format. Browsers cannot display it, and rendering the sensor data in a web context requires a wasm decoder such as LibRaw, which is how this converter handles it.

Full EXIF and XMP support is native, calibration data rides in DNG-specific tags, and original vendor MakerNotes can be preserved in the DNGPrivateData tag during conversion.

Convert DNG to another format