PNG to CUR Converter

Convert a PNG into a CUR file you can set as a Windows mouse cursor. Upload the image, convert, and download the CUR. No account, no watermark, and the upload is deleted after processing.

What a CUR file is

A CUR is almost exactly an ICO — the same container, the same way of storing one or more images with transparency. It differs in one respect, and that difference is the only reason the format exists.

A CUR records a hotspot: the single pixel within the image where the click actually happens. On the standard arrow the hotspot is the very tip. On a crosshair it is the centre. On a pointing hand it is the fingertip.

Everything else about a cursor is decoration. The hotspot is the part the computer cares about.

The hotspot, and why you will probably need to set it afterwards

This converter has no settings, so it cannot ask you where the hotspot should be. The CUR is written with a default position, which will be correct only by luck.

For some designs that genuinely does not matter. A plain dot or a small symbol used as a busy indicator will feel fine. For anything with a point — an arrow, a crosshair, a pen nib, a pointing finger — it matters a lot, and the symptom is unmistakable: the cursor looks right but clicks land somewhere other than where you aimed, by a consistent offset.

Setting it afterwards takes a minute in a free editor. RealWorld Cursor Editor and Greenfish Icon Editor Pro both open a CUR, show the hotspot as a crosshair, let you drag it to the correct pixel and save in place. Do that once and the cursor behaves properly from then on.

Preparing the PNG

Make it square. Cursors are square. A rectangular image is padded or squashed, neither of which flatters it. Crop to a square canvas before converting.

Keep the background transparent. This is why PNG is the right source — its alpha channel carries straight through, so the cursor floats over whatever is beneath it. A JPEG, having no transparency, produces a cursor sitting in an opaque box.

Design for 32 pixels. Standard Windows cursors are 32 by 32. Detail finer than a couple of pixels disappears entirely, so thin outlines, small text and subtle gradients are wasted. Bold shapes with clear silhouettes read well; intricate illustrations do not.

Make it visible on both light and dark. A cursor crosses white documents and dark photographs within one second. This is why the default Windows arrow is white with a black outline — it stays legible everywhere. A single-colour cursor without an outline disappears against backgrounds of that colour, which is maddening in use.

Sizes and high-DPI screens

32 by 32 is the traditional size, and on a modern high-resolution display it can look soft, because Windows scales it up.

A CUR can hold several sizes in one file — 32, 48, 64 and 128 are the useful ones — and Windows picks whichever suits the display and the user's pointer size setting. Building a multi-size cursor needs a cursor editor; a converted single-size file holds one image. For a 125% or 150% display, starting from a larger square PNG gives a better result than letting Windows enlarge a 32 pixel one.

How to convert PNG to CUR

1. Crop your PNG square and check the background is transparent.
2. Upload it, or drag it onto the upload area.
3. Convert.
4. Download the CUR, then set the hotspot in a cursor editor if your design has a point.

Installing the cursor in Windows

Put the CUR somewhere permanent first. Windows reads the file every time it draws the cursor, so if you leave it in Downloads and later clear that folder, the cursor reverts. C:\Windows\Cursors is the conventional home; a folder of your own works equally well as long as it stays put.

Then open Settings, go to Bluetooth & devices, then Mouse, then Additional mouse settings — on Windows 10 it is Devices, then Mouse, then Additional mouse options. Choose the Pointers tab, select which pointer you are replacing from the list, click Browse, and pick your CUR.

Use Save As to keep the arrangement as a named scheme. Without that, the next Windows update can quietly restore the defaults and you will be hunting for the file again.

Animated cursors are a different format

If you want a spinning or pulsing cursor, CUR cannot do it — it holds still images only. Animation uses ANI, which packs a sequence of frames with timing.

Converting a single PNG cannot produce one, since there is only one frame. Building an ANI means supplying every frame and assembling them in a cursor editor that writes the format.

PNG and CUR side by side

PNG (Portable Network Graphics) was published in 1996 as a patent-free replacement for GIF. It is lossless and supports a full alpha channel, which is what makes it the natural source for anything needing clean transparency.

CUR is Microsoft's cursor format, closely related to ICO and dating to the early years of Windows. It holds one or more square images with transparency, plus the hotspot coordinates that distinguish it from an icon.

FAQs

My clicks land in the wrong place.

The hotspot is wrong. It cannot be set during conversion, so open the CUR in RealWorld Cursor Editor or Greenfish Icon Editor Pro, drag the hotspot to the correct pixel, and save.