Fixing Corrupted Image Errors on Smashwords

One of the most common errors when uploading to Smashwords is a corrupted image — and it’s usually not actually corrupted, just mislabeled.

Why This Happens

Smashwords’ conversion process expects images in genuine .jpg format. This error usually shows up when an image was actually saved as a .png (or another format) but given a .jpg file extension without being properly converted — a common result of copying an image into basic editing software like Paint and saving it with the wrong extension. It looks like a .jpg to your computer, but the underlying file isn’t structured like one.

How to Confirm the Problem

Download the EPUB file Smashwords generated from your upload and open it. If an image displays as solid black, that’s the tell — it’s very likely a .png saved with a .jpg extension.

How to Find the Exact Broken Image

An EPUB file is actually just a renamed ZIP archive — you don’t need any special software to open one.

1. Make a copy of the EPUB file (so you don’t accidentally alter the original).
2. Rename the copy’s file extension from .epub to .zip.
3. On Windows: right-click the renamed file and choose Extract All. On Mac: double-click the renamed file to extract it using the built-in Archive Utility.
4. Open the extracted folder — you’ll see a directory structure with your book’s content files and an images folder.
5. The image file names in that folder correspond to the error number Smashwords gave you, which tells you exactly which image is the problem.

How to Fix It

Once you’ve identified the problem image:

1. Open it in an image editor.
2. Re-save it explicitly as a .jpg file (most editors have a clear “Save As” format dropdown — make sure JPG/JPEG is actually selected, not just the file extension).
3. Replace the image in your source manuscript with this properly-saved version.
4. Re-upload to Smashwords.