Cheapest ESRGAN API — $0.009 per Image

A production REST API that upscales any image 4x (or up to 16x) using Real-ESRGAN and returns a sharper, higher-resolution result. One HTTP call. The cheapest ESRGAN API on the market at $0.009 per image — less than a sixth of Let's Enhance and roughly a ninth of Topaz Gigapixel. 5,000 free trial credits, no credit card required.

Quick start — one API call

Sign up, copy your key from the dashboard, and POST your image. The endpoint returns a generation id; poll until status=completed, then download the upscaled image from output_url. Default scale is 4x; pass scale=8 or scale=16 for larger output.

curl -X POST https://api.pixelapi.dev/v1/image/upscale \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -F "image=@photo.jpg" \
  -F "scale=4"
# Response: {"id": "uuid", "status": "queued", "credits_used": 9.0}

# Poll until completed
curl https://api.pixelapi.dev/v1/image/UUID \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
# Response: {"generation_id": "uuid", "status": "completed", "output_url": "https://..."}

pip install pixelapi
---
from pixelapi import PixelAPI

client = PixelAPI(api_key="YOUR_API_KEY")
result = client.upscale(image="photo.jpg", scale=4)
result.save("photo_4x.png")

npm install pixelapi
---
import { PixelAPI } from "pixelapi";

const client = new PixelAPI({ apiKey: process.env.PIXELAPI_KEY });
const result = await client.upscale({ image: "./photo.jpg", scale: 4 });
await result.save("photo_4x.png");

composer require pixelapi/pixelapi
---
<?php
use PixelAPI\Client;

$client = new Client(getenv("PIXELAPI_KEY"));
$result = $client->upscale(["image" => "photo.jpg", "scale" => 4]);
file_put_contents("photo_4x.png", $result->getBody());

gem install pixelapi
---
require "pixelapi"

client = PixelAPI::Client.new(api_key: ENV["PIXELAPI_KEY"])
result = client.upscale(image: "photo.jpg", scale: 4)
File.binwrite("photo_4x.png", result.body)

go get github.com/pixelapi/pixelapi-go
---
import "github.com/pixelapi/pixelapi-go"

client := pixelapi.New("YOUR_API_KEY")
result, err := client.Upscale("photo.jpg", 4)
if err != nil { panic(err) }
result.Save("photo_4x.png")

Cheapest ESRGAN API pricing — vs Topaz, Let's Enhance, and more

Verified per-image API costs, October 2026. PixelAPI uses Real-ESRGAN and is priced to be the most accessible upscaling API for developers — no subscription required to start.

Pricing verified from each rival's public pricing page October 2026. Topaz: topazlabs.com/api. Let's Enhance: letsenhance.io/business. Vance.ai does not publish API pricing publicly; Upscale.media publishes INR prices only. PixelAPI's price is set at well under half the cheapest verifiable rival per our pricing principle.

What you get back

Supported input formats

Common workflows

The ESRGAN Upscaler API powers these production workflows. Each links to a setup guide:

More use-case guides: all industries →

Integrations & SDKs

Comparison vs alternatives

Rate limits & error handling

20 requests/minute on the free trial, 60 on Starter, 120 on Pro and 300 on Scale, plus 3/10/20/50 concurrent jobs respectively (see pixelapi.dev/docs/parallel-processing.html). Exceeding the limit returns HTTP 429 with a Retry-After header. Recommended: exponential backoff starting at 2s, doubling on each retry up to 30s. The Python and Node SDKs handle this automatically.

# Python SDK auto-retries 429 with backoff
from pixelapi import PixelAPI
client = PixelAPI(api_key="...", max_retries=4)
result = client.upscale(image="batch_item.jpg", scale=4)  # auto-retries on 429

Common error codes:

Frequently asked questions