Split any image into separate, editable layers

The output is the product

Every AI layer separator on the internet runs broadly similar models, so the model is not the differentiator — what you get back is. Most of them return a "layer sheet" (one big PNG with your objects arranged side by side on a grid) or a bare ZIP of images, and leave the actual layered file for you to assemble by hand in Photoshop. That is the part you wanted automated. Here the separation is written directly into a real layered file: named layers inside real groups, with each lifted selection attached as a non-destructive mask. There is no reassembly step.

Four ways to get layers, one shared stack

Different images want different tools, so there are four separators and they all feed the same layer panel. Photographs respond to AI grab — click any object and the browser model finds its outline. Portraits and products get Separate subject, one button that returns subject and background as independent layers. Busy scenes get Automatic Split: Cloudflare detects and names the objects, then one temporary precision pass tightens photograph masks or matches confirmed artwork against an automatic mask pool. Browser and Cloudflare models remain the fallback, and the whole scan starts at 1 credit rather than charging once per object. Flat art can also use the local color and artwork paths when crisp regions matter more than semantic objects. Mix the methods freely in one document.

The hard cases are the point

Anyone can separate a red ball on a white table. The test is a black dog on a dark wooden floor — low contrast, fine fur, whiskers against a similar tone. Below is our unretouched result from the server model. Fine hair, fur and fabric fringe are where every segmentation model earns or loses its reputation, and they are the reason there is a stronger server option at all rather than only the free in-browser one.

AI plus hands: what happens after the model runs

No separator is perfect on every image, and the honest question is not whether the AI misses but what you can do when it does. Here the AI result is an editable selection and a live layer stack, not a take-it-or-leave-it download. Add to the selection with a brush, erase where it overreached, invert it, or re-run just one object. Wand, lasso, rectangle and ellipse are all there for the cases where clicking is the wrong instrument. The last five per cent stays yours to control, which is precisely what a one-shot upload-and-download site cannot offer no matter how good its model is.

Layers with nothing missing underneath

Lifting an object normally leaves a hole in the background — fine until you move the object and the hole shows. Fill behind reconstructs the background so every layer is genuinely independently movable, and that single feature is the difference between a background remover with extra steps and a file that behaves the way a designer would have built it. Smooth backgrounds (sky, gradients, a flat wall) are filled free in your browser by a harmonic solver that reproduces a colour ramp exactly. Textured backgrounds go to the server fill, which starts at 2 credits; large or structured holes are routed through an HD pass that costs more, currently 6 credits. Every reconstructed region is prefixed AI_Fill_ in the layer name, so you always know which pixels were generated and which are yours.

Format-agnostic on purpose

Most converters are PSD-only because PSD is the only layered format their audience has heard of. But "a layered file" means different things in different pipelines: a masked PSD for a retoucher, an OpenRaster file for a Krita painter, a numbered folder of transparent PNGs for a video editor, a game engine or a slide deck. The layer stack gets built once here and then written into whichever container you need — same layers, your choice of file. PSD goes to Photoshop, Affinity and Photopea; ORA is native in GIMP, Krita and MyPaint, so it removes the PSD-importer failure mode entirely; the PNG stack goes anywhere at all.

Private by architecture, not by promise

The editor, the click-to-grab model and both file writers execute in your browser, so for those there is nothing to leak — no request is made at all. The AI steps that do run on our servers say so on the button, and background removal offers an in-browser engine beside its server one. That is worth stating precisely rather than as a boast, because retention policies in this category vary and are usually published. To pick the one competitor we can quote directly: imagetolayers.com's privacy policy states it keeps files "only as long as needed to provide downloads (e.g., 7 days on Free, longer on paid plans)" (checked 29 July 2026). Ours is 24 hours, backed by a storage lifecycle rule rather than a promise, and it only applies at all to the opt-in server features — each labelled with its credit cost before you click. Nothing is ever used to train models.