File Too Big for Email? Here's How to Shrink It

Gmail's limit is 25 MB, Outlook's is 20 MB — and that includes encoding overhead, so even less actually fits. When your email bounces over an attachment, you have three options: shrink it, split it, or send a link.

PDFs: compression works wonders

A scanned contract can easily hit 40 MB because every page is a huge image. Online PDF compression brings it down to 2–5 MB with no visible loss in readability. It runs right in your browser — upload, download, done in a minute.

Photos: reduce resolution, not quality

A phone photo runs 5–12 MB these days, but the recipient's screen only needs 1920 px wide — under 1 MB. Ten vacation photos drop from 80 MB to 8 MB. Run them through an image compressor and nobody will spot the difference.

Video: email is the wrong tool

Video almost never fits through email. Compress it (H.265 can cut size by 50%), or upload it to storage and send a link. For anything over 100 MB, a link is the only sane route.

Quick checklist

PDF → compress. Photos → resize. Video → compress or link. Multiple files → ZIP.

You can do all of it free in your browser at FileTools — no sign-up, no installs.