Comparison of image viewers
| Name | URL | DE | File formats | View functions | Edit functions | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ACDSee | [1] | W | BMP, EMF, GIF, JPEG, PCX, PIC, PICT, PNG, PSD, PSP, SGI, TGA, TIFF, WMF, XBM, various camera formats among others | Fullscreen, slideshow, zoom | Exposure, color, red eye, sharpness, noise, resize, crop, (lossless JPEG) rotate, effects | $50 |
| Adobe Bridge | [2] | W M | Displays all file types supported by Adobe Creative Suite | Thumbnails, slideshow, filmstrip, preview, versions with alternates | Stand Alone: rotate, rename, delete, move, copy, batch rename, add/Edit Metadata, camera raw image adjustments (crop, resize, exposure, contrast, white balance, curves, etc...)
Via Photoshop: contact sheet, merge to HDR, PDF presentation, Photomerge, Web picture gallery |
$0 1 |
| Brava Reader | [3] | W | TIFF, PDF, CSF | Zoom/Pan/Magnify View, Scrollable paging, Orient, Handles Large Files, Print w/Watermarks & Banners | None (view/print only) | $0 |
| Brava Desktop | [4] | W | TIFF, PDF, ISO, CALS, PNG, JPEG, GIF, JEDMICS, CGM, WMF, EMF, PCX, DWG, DWF, PLT and many more document, image and CAD drawing formats. | Zoom/Pan/Magnify View, Scrollable paging, Orient, Handles Large Files, Print w/Watermarks & Banners | Annotation & Redaction, Save To TIFF/PDF/CSF | $29-345 |
| CocoViewX | [5] | M | PNG, JPEG, GIF | Slideshow, fullscreen | Rotate, greyscale, HTML galleries | $0 |
| CPC View | [6] | W | TIFF, CALS, JEDMICS, PNM, CPC | Zoom, annotate, thumbnails, anti-aliasing | Rotate | $29.95 |
| Digikam | [7] | 
|
JPEG, EXIF, RAW etc.. | Fit to window, zoom, Slideshow+Effects | Rotate, crop, vertical/horizontal flip, lossless JPEG operations (rotate, flip), Plugins, Batch operations | 
|
| Elgorithms MagicTracer | [8] | W | PNG, JPEG, GIF, BMP, TIF, ICO, CUR, PCX, TGA, RAS, WMF, EMF, JPEG 2000, JPC, PNM | Fit to window, zoom | Color editing, filters, color management, color-depth maganagement, rotate, crop, resize | $49.95 |
| ExifPro Image Viewer | [9] | W | JPEG | $20 | ||
| Eye of GNOME | GNOME Desktop Environment Compatible | PNG, GIF, JPG, BMP, PNM, RAS, TIFF, ICO, XPM, SVG | Fit to window, zoom, print, full-screen, slideshow, image collection, image information... | Rotate, delete, flip, save as |
| |
| EyeBrowse | [10] | W | PNG, JPG, BMP, TGA, TIFF, PCX, WMF, EMF, DIB, GIF, ICO | Fit to window, zoom, file tree, file selector, print with print preview, keyboard control, hotkeys, screen captures... | Image manipulation (blur, resize, crop, sharpen, rotate, negative, vertical/horizontal flip, grayscale, brightness & contrast), batch file management, undo/redo actions | $0/$20 |
| FastStone Image Viewer | [11] | W | loading of: PNG, JPEG, BMP, JPEG 2000, GIF, PCX, TIFF, WMF, ICO, CUR, TGA, saving to: JPEG, JPEG2000, TIFF, GIF, PCX, BMP, PNG, TGA | Full-screen, slideshow, multiple sizes of thumbnails, EXIF, etc | Rotate, move, rename, 150+ transitional effects, lossless JPEG transitions, drop shadow effects, scanner support, histogram, ... | $0 |
| Firehand Ember | [12] | W | $60 | |||
| FuturixImager | [13] | W | 60 types - including JPEG, PNG, TIFF, JPEG 2000, RAW, DNG, SVG... | Full-screen, slideshow, zoom, histogram, metadata view, view-as-wallpaper... | Effects/filters, pencil, flood fill, eraser; JPEG lossless rotation; printing, scanning; screen capture... | $0 |
| F-Spot | [14] | X GNOME Desktop Environment Compatible | CR2, CRW, DNG, GIF, JPEG, MRW, NEF, ORF, PEF, PNG, PPM, RAF, RAW, SRF, SVG, TIFF | Full-screen, slideshow, zoom, multiple sizes of thumbnails. Export: HTML, Flickr, Gallery Project, and O.r.i.g.i.n.a.l | Tags, rotate, move, rename, hue, contrast, crop, resize |
|
| GQView | [15] | X GNOME Desktop Environment Compatible | See note | Full-screen, slideshow, zoom, color spectrum, three sizes of thumbnails | Rotate, move, rename, hue, contrast, |
|
| GraphicConverter | [16] | M | 190 types read, 79 types saved | Full-screen, slideshow, etc | Rotate, move, rename... | $35 |
| gThumb | [17] | X GNOME Desktop Environment Compatible | See note | Full-screen, slideshow, zoom, color spectrum, three sizes of thumbnails | Rotate, move, rename, hue, contrast, |
|
| Gwenview | [18] |
|
PNG, JPEG, MNG, GIF, XCF etc. | fullscreen, slideshow, zoom, rotate, in- decrease gamma/contrast/brightness, disk navigator, file tree, thumbnails, extended thumbnails, bookmarks... | add border, filter, effects, resize, rename, raw image converter, recompress, edit color... |
|
| Image Browser Arctic | [19] | W | 11 types | slideshow, bookmarks | encryption | $0 |
| Imaging Express | [20] | W | 30 types - including TIFF, PDF, JPEG, BMP, PCX, DCX, GIF, PNG, TGA... | Fit/Zoom/Pan image, anti-aliasing, smoothing, auto fit, auto paging, rotate, flip, negative, image information | Crop, auto border crop, deskew, despeckle, cut, erase, append/move/delete pages, rotate, flip, negative, annotate (highlight, text, sticky note, freehand, color line and shape, stamp), convert format, printing, scanning... | $0 /$39 |
| IMatch | [21] | W | over 50 types including RAW | $59.95 | ||
| imgSeek | [22] | X M W | 12 types | Search similar images, Fullscreen, slideshow, zoom, thumbnails, disk navigator tree, tag treeview. Export: HTML | Rotate, move, rename, hue, contrast, etc |
|
| iPhoto | [23] | M | PNG, JPEG, GIF, RAW (All QuickTime supported images) | Thumbnails, fullscreen, slideshow | Rotate, Cropping (custom and template), Brightness/Contrast, Red-eye, Retouch, Color Enhancement, B&W and Sepia Conversion... | $0 2 |
| IrfanView | [24] | W | ~70 types | Fullscreen, slideshow, zoom, thumbnails | Batch conversion | $0 |
| KSquirrel | [25] |
|
41 types | disk navigator, file tree, thumbnails, extended thumbnails, bookmarks, filters, fullscreen ... | resize, rotate, colorize, convert, print ... |
|
| Kuickshow | [26] |
|
See note |
| ||
| KView | [27] |
|
9 types, including PNG, JPEG | Zoom, rotate, resize, greyscale |
| |
| P3dO | [28] | W | $25 | |||
| Picasa | [29] | W X | 8 types including PNG JPEG and some movie formats | Zoom, lossless rotate, histogram, camera information | Crop, straighten, redeye, colour tweaking, effects | $0 |
| PMView Pro | [30] | W | Over 40 types including PNG JPEG TIFF | Zoom, rotate, paging, EXIF information | Crop, size, resolution, rotate, brightness, contrast, color, convert | $49.95 |
| Preview | [31] | M | All QuickTime images: | Zoom, rotate, metadata | Crop, straighten, color tweaking, profile assignment | $0 |
| Shell Picture | [32] | W | $30 | |||
| ShowImg | [33] |
|
JPEG, PNG, GIF, XCF, PSD etc. | fullscreen, slideshow, filters, search for similar images | Batch rename, convert filetype |
|
| Vallen JPegger | [34] | $0 | ||||
| VeriPic | [35] | W | Photo, video and audio formats supported by Windows including RAW | Fullscreen, Slideshow, Zoom, Progressive Compression Portable Show (99% compression, 1% of original size), SQL Database (User Account protection), 250 per second thumbnail display, 10,000 per second search of photo DB, titles and notes as keywords, multi-user access, network access, tamperproof time clock audit trail, fingerprint background removal, calibration 1:1 output, photo encryption, high performance distributed network CPU usage, targeted to store 10,000 to 1,000,000 photos per year per corporate or law enforcement user | Lossless Brightness, Lossless Contrast, Lossless Color Channel, Lossless Rotation | $5000 |
| ViewIt | [36] | M | PNG JPEG BMP GIF RAW PSD TIFF and many more | fullscreen, slideshow, print, digitall cameras, find duplicates, sort, search, mark | Batch rename, convert filetype, create www page, contact sheet | $20 |
| XnView | [37] | W M X | 400 types | $0 | ||
| Xv | [38] | X | GIF JPEG TIFF PBM PGM PPM XPM X11 bitmap Sun Rasterfile Targa RLE RGB BMP PCX FITS PM PostScript | View as ASCII or Hex, magnify, determine pixel values | Crop, pad, resize, rotate, flip, brightness, contrast, gamma, saturation, hue, colormap, reduce colors, dither, convert, and more | $25 |
| Zoner Photo Studio | [39] | W | supported formats | features | $0 |
- W = MS Windows compatible, M = Apple/Mac compatible, X = X Window System compatible
Note 1: Adobe Bridge comes free with the Adobe Creative Suite CS2, Adobe Production Studio and Photoshop Elements 4 for Mac OS X. Adobe Bridge cannot be purchased separately, but Photoshop Elements is available from Adobe for $70 and Photoshop is available for $400.
Note 2: The latest version of iPhoto comes free with a Mac. iPhoto cannot be purchased separately, but is part of the iLife-suite which is available from Apple Computer for $79.
File Formats
| Program | BMP | GIF | JPEG | JPEG 2000 | PNG | PSD | RAW | TIFF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PictureViewer | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Preview | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
View Functionality (detail)
| Program | Fullscreen | slideshow | zoom (styles) | thumbnail (sizes) | navigation views | sort (schemes) | search (criteria) | selection styles | metadata / EXIF | adjust image (functions) | hotkeys | other / special | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EyeBrowse | Yes
(fit, in/out) |
file-tree, ??? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Screen captures... | |||||||
| F-Spot | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | list, file-tree | Yes (keywords) | Yes | Export to HTML, Flickr, or O.r.i.g.i.n.a.l. | |||||
| gThumb | Yes | Yes
(random, forward, reverse) |
Yes
(fit, 1:1, remember, fit-if-larger, in/out) |
Yes
(48x48 - 256x256, 9 sizes) |
list, icon, subfolders, categories | Yes | Yes
(catalogs, categories) |
Yes
(name, comment, date, category, folder, recursive-folder) |
Yes
(linear, block, complex) |
Partial | Yes
(manipulate color, flip/rotate, etc) |
Yes | bookmarks, comments, rename series, create index image, create HTML album |
| GQView | Yes | Yes | Yes
(fit, 1:1, in/out) |
Yes
(24x24 - 256x256) |
list, dir-tree, collection | Yes | Yes
(collections, keywords, directory) |
Yes
(collections, keywords, filename, location, size, date, dimensions, comments, previous results) |
Yes
(block, linear, complex) |
Yes | Yes
(rotate, brightness, contrast) |
Yes | find duplicates, sort manager, recent collections |
| Fullscreen | slideshow | zoom (styles) | thumbnail (sizes) | navigation views | sort (schemes) | search (criteria) | selection styles | metadata / EXIF | adjust image (functions) | hotkeys | other / special |
Notes
- The filetypes that can be displayed by GQView and Kuickshow depend on the image-processing libraries (libjpeg, libpng, etc.) installed on the operating system.
- Prices will vary over time, and between suppliers, and are for approximate indication only
- Adobe Bridge is part of the Creative Suite which includes other programs, hence the unusually high price
- iPhoto is part of iLife, cost includes a DVD menu editor (iDVD), a video editor (iMovie), a music player (iTunes), a multimedia web publisher (iWeb), and an audio-sequencing program (GarageBand)
- ACDSee supports 61 various image formats and writes to 16. Reads 9 compression formats and writes to 2. Also ACDSee supports 33 Video Formats (Reads)
- Konvertor supports 1190 various image, audio and video formats and writes to 150. Reads 19 compression formats and writes to 1.
- Picasa has an experimental Linux version that runs under WINE.