Runs in your browser. Your files and text never leave your device - nothing is uploaded.
Add Text to a Photo Online
The Tools Kit’s free Add Text to Image tool puts a caption, label, or title on any photo in a few clicks. Upload a picture, type your text, pick a color, and slide the text to where you want it. The text is drawn in bold with a dark outline so it stays readable on light and dark backgrounds, and the finished image downloads as a PNG at its original size.
Everything happens in your browser: the photo is painted onto a canvas on your own device, the text is drawn on top, and nothing is uploaded. There is no signup, no limit on how many images you caption, and no watermark added to the result.
How to Add Text to an Image
- 1
Upload your image
Click the upload area or drag a photo onto it. JPG, PNG and WebP images work; files that are not images are rejected with a message.
- 2
Type your text
Replace "Your text here" with your caption, label or title. The tool draws one line of text per pass.
- 3
Set color, size and position
Pick a text color, then use the Size, Horizontal and Vertical sliders. Size is a percentage of the image width, and position is a percentage of the image width and height.
- 4
Add the text and download
Click Add Text to draw the caption onto the photo, check the preview, then click Download to save the result as a PNG image.
The preview does not update live as you drag the sliders; click Add Text each time to see the new version. Every click starts again from your original upload, so you can try as many combinations as you like.
Choosing the Right Text Size
The Size slider runs from 10 to 100 and is a percentage of the image width, not a fixed pixel size. Font size = slider value ÷ 100 × image width. On a photo 1,200 pixels wide, a setting of 10 gives 120px letters with a 10px outline, while the default of 40 gives 480px letters. On a 4,000-pixel phone photo, the same setting of 10 gives 400px letters, so the caption looks the same relative to the picture whatever its resolution.
Because the scale is large, most captions need a setting near the bottom of the range. The text is drawn on a single line with no wrapping, so a long sentence at a high size runs off both sides and is cut off. As a rough guide, a caption of 10 to 15 characters fills most of the width at a setting of 10. For a short word or a big title, slide the size up; for a full sentence, keep it at the minimum and consider splitting it into two passes.
Positioning Your Caption
The Horizontal slider sets where the center of the text sits, from the left edge (0%) to the right edge (100%); 50% centers it. The Vertical slider sets where the baseline, the line the letters rest on, sits from the top (0%) to the bottom (100%). The default of 50% and 85% places a centered caption near the bottom of the photo, the classic spot for a caption.
For a title at the top, raise the Vertical slider until the letters clear the top edge; at 0% the text sits almost entirely above the picture. Keep the Horizontal slider near 50% for long text, because a centered line moved toward an edge loses half of itself off the side. If you need the text in a fixed corner with adjustable transparency, the image watermark tool has corner presets and an opacity slider, and for classic top-and-bottom meme captions in Impact the meme generator squeezes long lines to fit the width for you.
Preparing the Photo Before and After
Since text size follows the image width, crop or resize first and caption second. Trim the frame with the image cropper or set exact dimensions with the image resizer, and brighten a dark shot in the photo editor so the text has a cleaner area to sit on.
The download is always a PNG, which keeps the text edges crisp but can be much larger than the original JPG. If the file is too big to post or email, convert it with PNG to JPG or shrink it with the image compressor. More editing tools are collected on the image tools page.
Common uses
- Captioning a photo for a social media post, blog, or newsletter
- Labeling a screenshot or diagram for documentation or a support ticket
- Adding a title or date to a photo for a presentation or slideshow
- Putting a name or credit line on a picture you share
- Writing a short message on a photo for an invitation or greeting
Add text to image terms explained
| Term | What it means here |
|---|---|
| Caption | A line of text that describes or titles a photo, usually placed near the bottom |
| Size slider (10-100) | Sets the font size as a percentage of the image width: 10 on a 1,200px-wide photo gives 120px text |
| Horizontal position | Where the center of the text sits, from 0% (left edge) to 100% (right edge) |
| Vertical position | Where the baseline of the text sits, from 0% (top edge) to 100% (bottom edge); the default is 85% |
| Outline (stroke) | A semi-transparent black edge drawn around each letter, one twelfth of the font size wide, so the text stands out |
| Canvas | The HTML drawing surface your browser uses to combine the photo and the text into a new image |
| PNG | A lossless image format; the edited image is always exported as PNG |
Frequently Asked Questions
Upload a photo, type your text, choose a color, set the size and position with the sliders, then click Add Text and Download. The tool is free, needs no account, and adds no watermark of its own.
No. The image is drawn onto an HTML canvas in your browser and the text is painted on top of it there. The finished picture is created on your own device and nothing is sent to The Tools Kit.
The slider runs from 10 to 100 and sets the font size as a percentage of the image width. On a 1,200px-wide image, 10 gives 120px text and 40 gives 480px text. Because it is relative, the same setting looks the same on a small or a large photo.
The text is drawn on one line with no automatic wrapping, so a long caption at a large size runs past the sides of the image and is clipped. Lower the Size slider, shorten the text, or move the Horizontal slider back toward 50%.
Horizontal sets where the center of the text sits across the image, and Vertical sets where the bottom of the letters (the baseline) sits down the image. The default of 50% and 85% gives a centered caption near the bottom. At 0% vertical the text sits above the picture, so only the tails of letters like g or y show.
Not in a single pass. Add the first line, download the result, then upload that new image and add the next line at a different vertical position.
No. Text is always drawn in your browser’s bold sans-serif font, which stays readable on most photos. You can change the color, size and position, but not the typeface, and there is no italic or opacity setting.
Every letter gets a semi-transparent black outline about one twelfth of the font size wide, which helps light text stand out. White or yellow text over a darker part of the photo usually reads best; move the position sliders to find a calmer area.
The edited image is always saved as PNG data at the same pixel dimensions as your original. The download is named text_ followed by your original file name, which keeps the original extension, so you may want to rename a .jpg download to .png.
Yes. Edit the text or any slider and click Add Text again. Each click redraws from your original upload, so the old text does not pile up underneath the new one.
Yes. Redrawing a photo through a canvas keeps only the pixels, so camera details and GPS location in the original file are not carried into the downloaded PNG.
Reviewed by Raja Jahangir · Last reviewed: October 2, 2026
How do you add text to an image online?
To add text to an image, upload a JPG, PNG, or WebP, type the caption, pick a colour, and set size and position with sliders: size runs from 10 to 100 as a percentage of image width, position from 0% to 100% on each axis. The text gets a dark outline for legibility and downloads as a PNG.