Higher PPI = More pixels?????

Question

Let me get this straight PPI is pixels per inch right? So if i reduce my PPI the image becomes more pixelated or what? How can i get more resolution if i have a LOW resolution and a High PPI? I don’t understand. I know that a higher PPI means a higher pixel density but doesn’t that equals more pixels?!? thereforE a larger X Y Resolution, i don’t get it

In: 6

Answer 1

The word “resolution” has been used two completely different ways in contexts that are ever so slightly different but still very close to each other, which can add to confusion here.

When people talk about computer screens they usually take “resolution” to mean total pixels that exist horizontally and vertically on the screen.

But there’s an older analog meaning of the word that pre-dates that, and it’s still used in some digital world cases, and that’s to say that resolution is NOT the total pixels but rather it’s how close together two dots can be and still be detected as two dots and not merge into 1 dot. If you talk about the resolution of the human eye, for example, it’s not a total count of how many “pixels” (rods and cones) you have on the retina, but of how close together they are on the retina and how that affects your ability to “resolve” two dots as separate dots. (Thus the word “resolution” – how tightly can you resolve the difference between the two things.)

In the computer world, there are still some contexts where this meaning of “resolution” is used – not a total count of pixels but a measure of how far apart two adjacent pixels are (which PPI can tell you, in inverse). This is relevant to the people who manufacture computer screen technology. It lets them know, for example, “If I want a screen resolution of X pixels across, and my pixel resolution with this particular screen technology is Y pixels per inch, then the screen has to be at least X*Y inches across to be able to do that. If I want that screen resolution on a smaller screen, I have to go with a more expensive, tighter pixel resolution to do it.

It gets confusing because you might have meant either meaning in play, and sometimes it swaps between them mid-sentence like in the above sentence.