A remove.bg alternative that stays free.

These are remove.bg's own words from its FAQ, checked 28 September 2026. The site is part of Canva, and Canva is folding it into its own products rather than running two.

• The website: “From 1 December 2026 at 9:00am CET, remove.bg's standalone website will no longer be available. Background removal is moving to Canva and API access to Leonardo.ai.”
• Pay-as-you-go credits: “Any unused PAYG credits will expire on 1 December 2026.” remove.bg recommends using them before then.
• Annual plans: they run until that morning, then end; unused time after the date is refunded pro rata to the original payment method, with no action needed.
• Monthly plans: they run until that morning and end automatically; “any final renewal on or after 1 November is free.”
• Account data, invoices, usage reports: accessible until 9:00 CET on 1 December, and not after. Export invoices from the Account page before then.
• The API: the self-service API stops accepting requests from 1 December 2026 and moves to Leonardo.Ai (also part of Canva), which needs a new account and key. Enterprise API contracts continue as normal.
• Plugins: the Photoshop plugin and the other integrations are discontinued on the same date. remove.bg points Photoshop users to Affinity, where its background removal needs a Canva Pro subscription.

Until then, remove.bg's free plan still gives preview-size downloads of up to 0.25 megapixels (about 625×400 pixels); full-resolution downloads cost credits. That preview limit is the reason most people go looking for an alternative in the first place.

It cuts out people. The model is MODNet, a portrait matting model, so it's built for photos where the subject is a person: passport and exam photos, ID photos, profile pictures, a portrait against a messy wall. Hair edges and shoulders come out well on a photo taken in decent light.

Products, pets, cars and logos are not what it's trained on. It will try, and simple shapes on a plain background often come out fine, but expect rough edges on anything that isn't a person. remove.bg and Canva use a general model that handles objects; if you need that, Canva's Background Remover is where remove.bg is sending its users, and it needs a Canva account (and Canva Pro for full use).

You get a transparent PNG or a JPEG on plain white, at the photo's own size up to 2,400 pixels on the longer side. There's no upscaling, no scene generation and no bulk mode: one photo at a time.

Nothing is uploaded. The first time, your browser fetches the model (about 7 MB) from sochen.dev and keeps it; the photo itself is processed in a web worker on your device. You can watch your browser's network tab while it runs.

For a form photo, the photo and signature resizer does the white background and the exact KB and pixel size together, checked against the notification.