Europium doped small particles presently receive great attention due to their excellent photoluminescent (PL) intensity, (photo)chemical stability, and linearity in the orange-red spectral region and find challenging biomedical application. Europium doped compounds are extremely good candidates for optical imaging due to stable luminescence, long fluorescence decay time, sharp emission peaks, i.e. narrow band width, in the red to near-infrared (NIR) region. Moreover, lasers based on red emission of europium also could be an attractive choice for medical application since NIR radiation can penetrate biological tissues such as human skin. This study allows to discuss luminescent properties of europium (5 at-% or 30 at-%) doped Y₃Al₅O₁₂ and Y₃Ga₅O₁₂ garnets in single crystals and powders. Europium enabled luminescent properties are discussed based on the concentration of europium and dopant local environment. All these compounds possess dominant ⁵D₀ → ⁷F₄ emission in the NIR region and are thus potential candidates for optical imaging.