Image formats

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Deprecation notice
The PNG and PNG8 image formats are being deprecated for all satellite-based styles within the HERE Raster Tile API. This change applies specifically to styles featuring satellite imagery, including satellite.day, explore.satellite.day, lite.satellite.day, and logistics.satellite.day.
This deprecation applies when the resource parameter is set to base or background. Instead of PNG or PNG8, use the JPEG format for these scenarios. Effective September 2026, while requests specifying PNG/PNG8 will not trigger an immediate failure, the service will automatically return JPEG-compressed tiles.

The image formats supported by the HERE Raster Tile API include PNG, JPEG, and PNG8. When you select an image format for your map tiles, consider the complexity of your map, the number of colors required, the need for transparency, and the trade-off between the file size and visual quality of the map image.

Based on the style, the recommended format parameter values are:

jpeg for any style that includes satellite imagery such as satellite.day style or explore.satellite.day style,
png8 for all the other styles,
png an an alternative to the png8 when you prefer full image colors over smaller image file size.

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Note
Due to the internal representation of satellite imagery, the PNG image format does not result in better image quality as the JPEG image format despite the much larger image size.