What FileForge does
FileForge is a browser-based file utility. You upload a file, it gets compressed, you download the result. That's the entire product.
Right now that means image compression (PNG, JPG, WebP) and PDF compression with three levels of aggressiveness. More tools are in progress — image resizing, format conversion, and cropping are next.
Your files are never stored. Processing happens on the server, the output is streamed back to you, and the buffer is discarded. Nothing persists after your download.
Who it's for
Anyone who regularly needs to shrink files before sending them — designers submitting assets, developers optimizing site images, people emailing large PDFs, anyone who's been told "your file is too big."
The free tier works for most people: 3 images or PDFs per session, up to 5MB/20MB per file. If you're processing in bulk or working with larger files, Pro is $4.99/month and removes all limits.
How it works
Image compression uses sharp — a high-performance Node.js library built on libvips. It handles PNG, JPEG, and WebP with adjustable quality settings, including palette-mode PNG for files that can benefit from color reduction.
PDF compression uses pdf-lib to strip embedded metadata and re-compress JPEG images inside the PDF using mozjpeg. The three compression levels (light, medium, aggressive) target different trade-offs between file size and visual quality.
The technical stack
- Node.js + Express backend
- sharp — image processing
- pdf-lib — PDF manipulation
- PostgreSQL — session tracking
- Render — hosting
- Stripe — Pro subscriptions
Free vs. Pro
The free tier is genuinely useful and not crippled. You get up to 3 images and 3 PDFs per session, with a 5MB image cap and 20MB PDF cap. No watermarks, no forced sign-up, no degraded output quality.
Pro ($4.99/month) unlocks 100MB file sizes, unlimited compressions per session, and priority processing. It's for people who use the tool daily or deal with larger files.