Why Am I Seeing an Error PNG File Instead of the Image?

dasylisa

Member
Some images won’t load correctly and just display error png messages. Could this be a corrupted file, server issue, or unsupported format problem?
 
I have also witnessed this when the actual image is damaged. When the upload has been disrupted or it has only saved a portion of the file, then browsers are unable to display it and instead display an error PNG file. Simple re-uploading of the image or looking at it locally normally shows whether the file is spoilt or not.
 
The other issue is a server or hosting problem. The server may not be able to retrieve the image in time or there can be permission or path issue, and therefore it tends to give default error PNG file. It occurs particularly when migration/CDN changes have taken place, and the image URLs no longer lead to the correct place.
 
Format compatibility is not to be disregarded either. Some encodings such as AVIF or even some WebP encodings cannot be supported by older browsers or certain platforms. Once that occurs, the browser can revert to the display of an error PNG file rather than the image. It is normally resolved by converting the picture to JPG or PNG.
 
Caching can also play a role. On a particular occasion, I managed to resolve a similar error PNG file problem by simply clearing my browser cache or disabling a faulty cache application. The web browser was attempting to fetch an old version of the missing image.
 
Mixed content may be the issue in case such happening is occurring only on secure pages (HTTPS). Image loading using HTTP on an HTTPS site can cause them to fail with an error PNG file being returned. In my case, changing the URLs of all the images to HTTPS corrected it.
 
More often than not, it is not only that. I would begin by viewing the image itself in a new tab, reviewing the logs of the server, and trying another format. That typically reduces the information on whether the error that PNG file is being caused by corruption, server configuration or compatibility.
 
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