Unsharp masking (USM) is an image sharpening technique, first implemented in darkroom photography, but now commonly used in digital image processing software. Its name derives from the fact that the technique uses a blurred, or "unsharp", negative image to create a mask of the original image. The unsharp mask is then combined with the original positive image, creating an image that is less blurry than the original. The resulting image, although clearer, may be a less accurate representation of the image's subject.

In the context of signal processing, an unsharp mask is generally a linear or nonlinear filter that amplifies the high-frequency components of a signal.

For the photographic darkroom process, a large-format glass plate negative is contact-copied onto a low-contrast film or plate to create a positive image. However, the positive copy is made with the copy material in contact with the back of the original, rather than emulsion-to-emulsion, so it is blurred. After processing, this blurred positive is replaced in contact with the back of the original negative. When light is passed through both negative and in-register positive (in an enlarger, for example), the positive partially cancels some of the information in the negative.

Because the positive has been blurred intentionally, only the low-frequency (blurred) information is cancelled. In addition, the mask effectively reduces the dynamic range of the original negative. Thus, if the resulting enlarged image is recorded on contrasty photographic paper, the partial cancellation emphasizes the high-spatial-frequency information (fine detail) in the original, without loss of highlight or shadow detail. The resulting print appears more acute than one made without the unsharp mask: its acutance is increased.

In the photographic procedure, the amount of blurring can be controlled by changing the "softness" or "hardness" (from point source to fully diffuse) of the light source used for the initial unsharp mask exposure, while the strength of the effect can be controlled by changing the contrast and density (i.e., exposure and development) of the unsharp mask.

For traditional photography, unsharp masking is usually used on monochrome materials; special panchromatic soft-working black-and-white films have been available for masking photographic colour transparencies. This has been especially useful to control the density range of a transparency intended for photomechanical reproduction.

The same differencing principle is used in the unsharp-masking tool in many digital-imaging software packages, such as Adobe Photoshop and GIMP. The software applies a Gaussian blur to a copy of the original image and then compares it to the original. If the difference is greater than a user-specified threshold setting, the images are (in effect) subtracted.

Digital unsharp masking is a flexible and powerful way to increase sharpness, especially in scanned images. Unfortunately, it may create unwanted conspicuous edge effects or increase image noise. However, these effects can be used creatively, especially if a single channel of an RGB or Lab image is sharpened. Undesired effects can be reduced by using a mask—particularly one created by edge detection—to only apply sharpening to desired regions, sometimes termed "smart sharpen".