On the left is a sample reduced with a non-smooth resampling method. On the right is the same sample reduced with a smooth resampling method.

     

Below are resampling methods available in a few software packages.

	Smoothing	Edge Preserving	Recommended
PrintShopPro5.01	Bilinear	Bicubic & Pixel Resizing	Smart
Picture Window 2.5	Smooth	Smooth & Nearest Neighbor	Smooth
Microsoft Photo Editor 3.0	Smooth	'unchecked'
Adobe PhotoShop 5.0	Bilinear & Bicubic	Bicubic & Nearest Neighbor	Bicubic

PrintShopPro5 provides 'smart' resampling to automatically select the best method for the image being resized.

Both Picture Window and Adobe PhotoShop provide single recommended methods optimized for both smoothing and edge sharpness.

In Microsoft Photo Editor, a non-smooth resampling method is available by deselecting the Smooth method.

The recommended resampling methods above are also the default setting for those software packages.

Since different software packages implement these methods differently and evaluating the results is somewhat subjective, you may want try them out yourself.