How to Batch Convert HEIC to JPG

Get the files off the phone first

Most of the pain in a bulk conversion happens before any converting starts. Getting several hundred photos off an iPhone cleanly is its own problem.

• USB cable to a PC: the phone appears as a device, and the photos are under Internal Storage, DCIM. This copies the original HEIC files.
• USB cable to a Mac: open Image Capture rather than Photos — it lets you choose a destination folder and does not try to build a library.
• iCloud Photos on the web: select and download, which gives you a ZIP. Large selections sometimes arrive as several ZIPs.
• Do not use a messaging app to move them. It re-compresses everything and you lose quality before you start.

The browser route — any operating system

Because the decoding runs in your browser rather than on a server, there is no queue, no per-file cap and no daily limit. The practical constraint is memory: a few hundred files at a time is comfortable on a laptop, and if a very large batch slows the machine down, split it into two or three passes.

1. Open the HEIC to JPG converter.
2. Drag the whole folder onto the drop zone, or use the folder upload button.
3. Set quality once — 90 or above for photos you are keeping.
4. Convert, then use Download All to get a single ZIP.

The Mac route — Finder's built-in converter

This has been built into macOS since Monterey and handles large selections without complaint. Untick Preserve Metadata if the photos are going anywhere public — otherwise every file keeps its GPS coordinates.

1. Select every HEIC file in Finder — Command-A selects the whole folder.
2. Right-click the selection, choose Quick Actions, then Convert Image.
3. Set Format to JPEG, Image Size to Actual Size, and decide about metadata.
4. Click Convert. Every copy lands in the same folder.

Set up a folder that converts automatically

If you import from a phone regularly, do this once and never think about it again. On a Mac, Automator can attach a Folder Action to a watched folder: anything dropped in is converted to JPEG automatically. On Windows, a scheduled script using a command-line tool such as ImageMagick does the same thing.

It is twenty minutes of setup that pays for itself the third time you import.

Settings that matter when you are doing hundreds

Keep the originals

A converted JPG is a delivery copy. The HEIC holds 10-bit colour, any Portrait-mode depth map and Live Photo motion, and takes roughly half the space. Once you have the JPGs you need, archive the HEICs rather than deleting them — you cannot get back what the conversion discarded.