To round image corners in After Effects, apply the built-in Rounded Corners effect from Effect > Stylize to a footage layer and adjust the Radius value in pixels, or draw a rounded-rectangle mask on the layer and use that mask to clip the image above it. Both paths leave the four corners transparent in a PNG render from the Render Queue, because After Effects writes alpha just like any other channel. A radius of 50 pixels on a 1080-wide layer produces a clearly visible curve, while 10 pixels is barely noticeable on a busy background. If your goal is a single still PNG with rounded corners for a slide deck, a web mockup, or a social card, the same rounded rectangle can be produced faster in a browser tab with the Round Image Corners tool, which keeps the source's exact pixel dimensions and only turns the outside corner pixels transparent, leaving you with a downloadable full-resolution PNG instead of a full render queue export.
Why After Effects has two ways to round corners
After Effects gives you two distinct routes to the same visual outcome, and the route you choose changes the shape of the project file. The Rounded Corners effect is a non-destructive pixel effect that can be toggled on or off, animated over time, and removed from any layer without deleting artwork. A rounded-rectangle mask is part of the layer's geometry and travels with the layer through precomps, expressions, and motion tracking, which is what you usually want when a rounded card needs to stay attached to its parent composition.
Effects are easier to copy between layers, easier to undo, and easier to swap out at the last minute before delivery. Masks integrate directly with Track Mattes, shape layers, and matte refinement, which is what you need when you are compositing a rounded UI element on top of a moving background. Both routes end in a transparent alpha, so a PNG render from the Render Queue will show the rounded shape sitting cleanly on a checkered background, and a PNG export will keep the rounded boundary as soon as the file leaves After Effects.
Round image corners in After Effects with the Rounded Corners effect
- Import the image into a Project panel bin and drag it onto a new composition so its dimensions become the comp size.
- With the image layer selected, open the Effects & Presets panel and search for Rounded Corners under the Stylize category.
- Double-click the effect name to apply it to the layer, or drag it onto the layer. The image now has curved corners driven by a single Radius control.
- Open the Effect Controls panel and raise or lower the Radius value, which is measured in pixels, until the curve matches the look you want.
- Toggle Edge Radius on if you want a subtle anti-aliased inner curve on the corner rather than a hard pixel boundary.
- Add the composition to the Render Queue, choose a PNG format with alpha enabled, and click Render to write the rounded PNG.
The output PNG keeps the source image's pixel dimensions because the effect only changes which pixels are visible, not the canvas size. That matches what the browser-based Round Image Corners tool does for static files, just with the overhead of a full After Effects project, render queue, and PNG export.
Round image corners in After Effects with a rounded-rectangle mask
- Select the Rounded Rectangle tool from the shape tools and double-click the composition panel to draw a full-frame shape that fills the comp.
- In the layer's Mask properties, leave Mask Expansion at zero for a frame-aligned shape or adjust it if the rectangle needs to grow past the comp bounds.
- Raise Mask Feather slightly if you want a softer transition between the image and the transparent area; leave it at zero for a sharp pixel edge.
- If you need the mask to clip another layer, drag the rounded-rectangle shape layer above the image and set the image's Track Matte to Alpha Matte, or convert the rounded shape into a mask on the image layer directly.
- Position the rounded rectangle over the photo so the image stays fully contained inside the curve, then add the composition to the Render Queue with a PNG output that includes alpha.
The mask workflow is more flexible when you need to animate the corner radius over time, because you can keyframe the mask's Roundness property directly. The Rounded Corners effect does not expose an animatable radius by default, so masks are usually the better pick for a card that morphs into a square as it slides into place. Masks are also the right choice when each corner needs a different radius, which the built-in effect cannot do.
Skip After Effects and round corners in your browser
Launching After Effects for a single still image adds a lot of overhead. A modern AE session loads the application, decodes the source into a render frame, runs through the Render Queue, and writes a PNG sequence that you then have to convert into a single file. For a one-off icon, profile picture, or web mockup element, a focused browser tool is faster, lighter on system memory, and easier to repeat.
The Round Image Corners tool clips a local JPG, PNG, or WebP to a same-size rounded rectangle inside the current browser tab. File decoding, the clipping path, PNG encoding, the preview, and the download all happen on the same canvas without any upload, so the source never leaves the machine. The output keeps the source's exact width and height, so a 1920 by 1080 input comes back as a 1920 by 1080 PNG with rounded corners, ready to drop into a slide or web layout.
How to round image corners with the Round Image Corners tool
- Open the tool and choose a local JPG, PNG, or WebP file that is no larger than 25 MiB.
- Wait for the decoded image to appear in the preview, and confirm that the decoded dimensions stay within the 20,000-pixel-per-side and 40-megapixel shared browser safety budget.
- Move the radius control from 1 percent up to 50 percent of the image's shorter side; the value is calculated from whichever dimension is smaller so corners stay symmetric on wide, tall, and square sources.
- Select Round corners. The tool renders one canvas that clears to transparency, clips a rounded rectangle, draws the decoded source once at its original dimensions, and exports a same-size PNG preview.
- Inspect the preview, check the reported dimensions and the whole-pixel radius shown next to the result, then download the file. The download is named with the suffix -rounded-corners.png to make the format change visible at a glance.
- To try a different curve, change the radius and select Round corners again. The previous result is invalidated, no upload is needed because the file is already in browser memory, and temporary object URLs are revoked as they are replaced.
The tool rounds the radius to a whole output pixel so the curve is reproducible. For a 400 by 200 pixel image, a 25 percent radius produces a 50 pixel curve; on a portrait image the same percentage is taken from the width instead, which keeps the look consistent across orientations. The result line reports source-matching dimensions, the computed whole-pixel radius, the output format, and an approximate file size so you can verify that a landscape or portrait file was not silently resized before download.
What the tool changes and what it leaves alone
The tool does not resize, crop, stretch, recenter, or paint a background behind the transparent corners. It clips the corners to transparency and writes the result as PNG. JPEG sources are decoded and re-encoded, so the byte size of the exported PNG can grow compared with the original JPEG and the original EXIF metadata is not preserved, because canvas export rebuilds the image from decoded pixels rather than copying source bytes. Existing transparency inside a PNG or WebP source stays available within the rounded shape, subject to normal browser decoding and PNG encoding.
The output is always a PNG because JPEG cannot store transparent corner pixels. The tool will not produce a partial or silent download on a problem file; empty files, unsupported types, decode failures, unavailable canvas support, invalid radius values, and failed PNG encoding each surface a visible error instead. Changing the file or the radius invalidates the previous result, and a stale asynchronous export cannot overwrite a newer choice, which keeps the preview honest even on slower machines.
When to stay in After Effects and when to switch to a browser tool
| Scenario | After Effects | Round Image Corners tool |
|---|---|---|
| Animating a corner radius over time | Keyframe mask Roundness or the Rounded Corners effect | Static radius only, one PNG per export |
| Single still PNG with rounded corners | Full project, render queue, PNG export | Same-size PNG in one browser step |
| Transparent corner pixels | Supported in any alpha-aware format | Always exported as PNG |
| EXIF metadata preserved | Format-dependent, possible in sidecar workflows | Rebuilt from decoded pixels, EXIF is dropped |
| Different radius per corner | Possible with four-corner masks or shape modifiers | One equal radius for all four corners |
| File leaves the local machine | Only if you save to cloud storage or sync | No, everything runs in the browser tab |
| Batch processing dozens of files | Possible with a script or expressions | One image per session |
For a still icon, avatar, app-store card, or product thumbnail where the four corners share one radius, the browser tool returns the same end result with a shorter path. For animation, per-corner control, masking into a comp, or any project where the source needs to keep its metadata, After Effects is the right stage. The tool is deliberately focused on one image and one equal radius for all four corners, so it does not offer separate corner radii, masks, circles, decorative frames, shadows, gradients, batch processing, or lossless JPEG editing. Reach for a layered desktop editor when any of those controls or a reversible source file are required.