Certified Professional Photographer (CPP) Practice Exam

JPEG files render color at how many bits per color?

1. 10

2. 16

3. 8

4. 12

The correct answer is: 8

JPEG files typically render color at 8 bits per color channel. This means each of the three primary colors—red, green, and blue—has 256 possible intensity values (ranging from 0 to 255). The combination of these intensity values across the three channels results in over 16 million possible colors that can be displayed in a JPEG image. This 8-bit per channel standard is widely used for digital images, particularly for those being shared and displayed on the web, as it balances decent color representation with manageable file sizes. Higher bit depths, such as 10, 12, or 16 bits per channel, are used in formats like TIFF or RAW for applications requiring greater color fidelity and tonal range. However, JPEG's limitation to 8 bits per channel is a practical choice for everyday photography, as it provides enough color detail for most standard viewing purposes while keeping file sizes relatively small.