There are two main types of graphics—raster and vector. The GIMP is intended for working with raster graphics, which is the normal format for photographs and scanned images. Raster graphics consist of pixels—small blocks of color that together create the entire image. The files can easily become quite large because of this. It is also not possible to increase the size of a pixel image without losing quality. The GIMP supports most common formats of raster graphics.
Unlike raster graphics, vector graphics do not store information for all individual pixels. Instead, it uses geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and polygons. Vector images can be scaled very easily. There are many specialized applications for vector graphics, for example Inkscape. The GIMP has only a very limited support for vector graphics. For example, the GIMP can open and rasterize vector graphics in SVG format or work with vector paths.