What does 72 dpi mean?
All digital photo images are made up of dots. When referring to images, 72 dpi stands for 72 dots per inch, a number that is called the ‘resolution’ of the image. A resolution of 72 dots per inch is common for images shown on a computer monitor, like the photo at the top of this page. For printing, higher resolutions will look better, perhaps 200 to 300 dpi. Most photo manipulation software packages (like Photoshop, for example) provide the ability to adjust the resolution and size of the image. For example, you can increase the resolution to get a better looking print by making the photo smaller, packing the available dots of the image into fewer inches. High resolution photo files (hi-res) have lots of dots so you can get print-quality resolution even in an 8×10 or larger print.
