Best Free Digital Image Viewer
This is one of those software categories where the quantity and quality of free programs is at least equal to that of commercial ones, so the selection isn't easy, and personal convenience will unavoidably appear as a main factor for this review.
And there's also the question of what exactly we mean by an "image viewer". With so many contenders that offer loads of features like editing, filtering, batch processing, organizing, publishing and the rest, that name may be a bit too restrictive, as we always tend to demand some additional editing features apart from the basic viewing and browsing functions (these are sine qua non, in my opinion). Thus many imaging applications overlap categories, and the differences for our review should be based mainly on the aspects of access speed, zooming capabilities, and other tasks not directly related to extensive image editing. Though I know many users will prefer all-in-one programs, I feel that they don't fit into this category, and feature bloat precludes their recommendation.
One of the best choices is the classic IrfanView. Irfan is a first-class product, but one for which I have mixed feelings. It's an amazingly capable application and very fast at displaying images, something I consider essential for a viewer. It offers plenty of functions for editing, converting, batch processing, slideshow exporting, etc. and supports almost any graphics plug-in. Some of the features (its resizing algorithm, for instance) are outstanding and even rank above a big fish like Photoshop. But, although many users just love it, it just doesn't work the way I'm used to. As a personal "inconvenience" I'll say wheel zooming requires a press of the Ctrl key, and I don't see the point in having a separate module for thumbnails. This, however, may be exactly what others prefer, and the same applies to the interface, which looks a bit too simple to me. But, obviously, this program is a real winner.
IrfanView main window
IrfanView thumbnail module
A product I feel more comfortable with is XnView. Like Irfan, it's very versatile; it can read and display nearly 400 types of graphic files, and convert any of these to more than 50 formats. It displays images very quickly, and these may be viewed full screen, as slideshows or as thumbnails. It's quite capable at processing images, too; you can rotate, crop, resize, adjust brightness and color, apply filters or effects, create a web page and much more. These operations can also be carried out from a batch file, which is ideal for converting or processing multiple images with custom adjustments, and the thumbnail window can fit your preferences with several layouts and sizes. It offers instant hotkey and wheel zooming, and dragging the image around at any zoom level is perfectly smooth. It also allows having several images open at the same time and even running multiple instances of the program. It supports drag and drop, lots of plug-ins, is available in 44 languages and has full cross-platform support, including Mac and Linux (unlike its competitors reviewed here). A heavyweight.
XnView thumbnail and preview window
XnView main window
My third choice is FastStone Image Viewer. There are various reasons to choose this, but the main one is its superb interface, especially in full screen mode, with different pop-up panels appearing when the mouse cursor reaches any side of the screen. You can easily access every function of the program (one at a time, of course) from this window with no other element disturbing you until you decide it with just a mouse move, including a very handy thumbnail slider to browse your images. Even the smallest menus or panels in any of the modes are clear and well designed, and there are several skins available. The zoom system is very clever, too. It magnifies to a custom preset level with just one click, and "average-user" files are displayed quickly, the same as their thumbnails; but it's slower showing bigger files (>20MB, depending on the format) and both Irfan and XnView perform much better in this field, though for most users that won't be an issue. It may be a good idea to disable the preview panel in the thumbnail window to speed things up. It also supports all major graphic formats and popular digital camera RAW formats as well, and offers good basic image editing facilities, lossless JPG rotation, an excellent cropping module, full batch processing options and great slideshow capabilities. Much to like here.
FastStone thumbnail and preview window
FastStone fullscreen window with thumbnail slider on
FastStone has a "little brother" called FastStone MaxView which is essentially the same program, but it's limited to the viewer and a few features.
This impressive entry in the Wikipedia features a chart comparing a considerable amount of free and commercial image viewers. Most of these products are also given detailed individual entries and include links to their websites.
IrfanView
Website: http://www.irfanview.com/
Download link: http://www.irfanview.com/
Author: Irfan Skiljan
Current version: 4.20
Version date: July 16, 2008
License: Freeware for private use
Download File size: 1.25MB, plug-ins 6.94MB
Operating Systems Supported: 95/98/NT/2000/ME/XP/2003/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: No
Portable Version Available: Yes
Non-English languages supported: Multi language support
Other relevant information: Extensive plug-ins available, dual-monitor configurations
XnView
Website: http://www.xnview.com/
Download link: http://pagesperso-orange.fr/pierre.g/xnview/endownloadwin32.html
Author: Pierre-Emmanuel Gougelet
Current version: 1.94.2
Version date: August 1, 2008
License: Freeware for private use
Download File size: Basic 2.12MB, Standard 4.90MB, Complete with plug-ins 10.5MB
Operating Systems Supported: Windows 95/98/NT/2000/ME/XP/Vista, Windows 3.x, Mac OS X, Linux x86/Linux ppc, FreeBSD x86, OpenBSD x86, NetBSD x86, Irix mips, Solaris sparc, Solaris x86, HP-UX, AIX
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: No
Portable Version Available: No, but the zip file can be run from USB flash drives
Additional Software Required: None
Non-English languages supported: 44 languages (depending on versions)
Other relevant information: Extensive plug-ins available, dual-monitor configurations
FastStone Image Viewer
Website: http://www.faststone.org/
Download link: http://www.faststone.org/FSViewerDownload.htm
Author: FastStone Soft
Current version: 3.5
Version date: January 15, 2008
License: Freeware for private use
Download File size: 4.24MB, portable 4.18MB
Operating Systems Supported: 98/2000/Me/XP/2003/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: No
Portable Version Available: Yes
Non-English languages supported: Multi language support only in version 3.2 and older: Chinese (Simp & Trad), Danish, Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish
Other relevant information: Supports dual-monitor configurations
Tutorial available: 3.7MB
Related Topics
Best Free Digital Photo Organizer
Best Free Digital Editor
Best Free Media Player
This software category is maintained by volunteer editor Marc Darkin. Registered site visitors can contact Marc by clicking here.
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Program works great on my 64 bit Vista Ultimate. No kidding!
LOL Mikki
What program?
I like marcdarkin's review.
I remember that the Irfanview's author once mentioned on the web site -- at beginning it was the world of Acdsee and Irfanview...... now xnview is stealing irfanview's interface...... Sounds funny to me ---- I once use sea (dos version), then acdsee..... irfanview? Never heard of it at that time...... on the other hand, if xnview really follow irfanview's interface, how could it become so popular?
Nowadays many programs falls in the image viewer category are over qualified. Therefore feature collection, ease of use, as long as the download size, makes Faststone and Xnview stand out from others like ibrowser, freshview, alview and forcevision (a very promising viewer, unique in selectors such as magic wand, for image editing, also features a simple FFT spectral domain filter, however, I can neither add text nor batch rename/process).
XNview is most powerful "viewer" I have used. I can watch video (no rmvb), view pdf, text, even hex code in the browser window. It only get very slow when it try to open a large binary / video files -- but that is the past, the latest version will not open every file you are viewing, which is a good thing. The other wonderful thing is that it uses the PS compatible filters and plugins. AND it respect user's opinion -- I have choice to decide where to install it and where to place the start folder.
Faststone, on the other hand, is a very convenient image viewing and handling tool. The screen capture is relatively easier than XNview, and the edit window allow you to add arrow, notes, rectangles quickly. These make it ideal for illustration purpose. The image processing is far behind xnview (or even forcevision). There is also a "bug", or "misspelling" in Edit>Other>Morph, it indeed carries out a mosaic operation.
Besides all those popular star, alview is pretty good for those who would like to add board fading or add callouts to their photos.
Alview doesn't exist -- ALSEE instead http://www.altools.com/ALTools.aspx
Thanks for your comments. It would be fair to say I fully agree with them and they are a perfect complement to my own review.
I haven't tried a couple of the programs you mentioned, and I'll give them a chance, but now I know your opinion I'll probably be a bit biased :>)
Marc
IrfanView doesn't seem to work in Mint Elyssa ... :( - I like Gwenview for what it's worth ...
Chris.
I just checked out MyViewPad (as recommended by Marc).
Up until now I have been happy with Windows Picture and Fax Viewer for viewing jpg's.
With just 5 minutes of playing with MyViewPad, I discovered -
Enter key toggles to and from full screen.
PageUp and PageDown to navigate to next file.
+ key to zoom.
You can reposition within the zoomed image by click(hold down), and drag.
The zoomed image is a bit sharper than WP&FV.
You can see a thumbnail in the Open File 'browser'.
I am converted (thanks Marc)
Now for my next wish.
I am happy with Paint when I copy an image to the Clipboard, and wish to save it.
However it annoys me that it does not remember two things -
1) I wish to Save as jpg, not bmp.
2) It keeps defaulting to the 'mine shaft' of 'My Pictures' folder, which I hate. I have a folder called C:\Downloads where I save everything. I use XYplorer free which now has a permanent tab for that folder. And it is sorted with most recent at the top (so I can find them easily and move them to desired folder later). I would like Paint to remember where I last stored something.
Does anyone know of a free simple program that does not have those two faults ?
Thanks,
Rob
Printkey2000.exe
Been using XnView for years and would place it #1 after having tried the others you listed. I love the Batch Rename feature. Very easy to understand.
Phylis Sophical
My favourite is PHOTOFILTRE. Great for touching up your pics.
http://www.photofiltre.com/
Robert Hamill
Photofiltre isn't exactly an image viewer but an editor. Your comment should be posted somewhere else in the site. Actually it's one of the products Mike Norris recommends there:
http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-digital-editor.htm
Marc
I'm very surprised that Google's Picassa didn't even get a mention. My wife is the photographer/editor in our family. She's tried all of the above (and then some). She really only uses Picassa for viewing and organizing. Her only complaint is that she can't put it on her Mac (so she commandeers my computer whenever working with photos). For editing, it's Photoshop Elements 6... no contest. Again, she's tried all the freebies (as well as trials of other pay-packages), and nothing comes close to PE6 for her. Add a couple small, freeware batch resizing & renaming tools (of which there are many available), and she's good to go.
Fellow editor Tony Bennett has already answered we haven't forgotten you and you can find Picasa in the category he edits, but I guess my own reply might be convenient.
The reason why Picasa (and some other cool software) doesn't get a mention here is basically explained in the first two paragraphs of my article. And yes, sure it is a very capable program, probably (and maybe questionably, too) the best for organizing pictures, but I don't think it's a good candidate to stand among the best image viewers.
The following is a fragment from the long comments I wrote mainly about XnView and FastStone further down this page:
"Picasa is great, too, but not as straightforward as it should for my needs, and even basic functions like saving files appear somewhat tricky. Anyway, its fancy look, the various methods for organizing and gathering pictures together into unlimited custom folders without actually moving them from their original locations, and the web publishing abilities can be really attractive to a lot of users. And it comes from Google ;)"
Now I'll add it doesn't support several file formats I work with, especially PNG, and only writes to JPG, for what I know. Besides, the management of external hard drives is ridiculously complicated with all those imports and exports to your main drive and back. Couln't it show all the drives in the system directly in the tree under My PC? I might be doing things in a wrong way; if so, please somebody tell me. But an application like this should show basic things like that clearly from the first time you run it, be more intuitive and make your workflow easier. This isn't the case, unfortunately for a piece of otherwise great software.
Marc
Hi just to let you know that I have Picassa on my editorial:
http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-digital-photo-organizer.htm
So we haven't forgotten you. Is there a difference between a browser and an organiser? Maybe that will start a debate.
Tony
I am still using faststone, its fast and easy.
however, through freewaregenius, i have recently started to play with Pictomio and boy, that looks hellish good!
The latest Faststone beta is x64 compatible and is quite fast with XP64 systems having 4GB RAM and above.
regards
Arup
My pick for Image Viewing ONLY - Max View [Fastone]!
rj04
thank s marc
sorry for fastone( i should stop drink...) really it s great, i use fastone viewer it since long time, at each update i never look in the toolbar of "explorateur" and in each download i was in "image"
mode....
fastone is perfect,...read video .... and its number one for me
I now delete xnviewer
since 06/06 fastone has a new update of Fastone resizer (2.6) and its a nice soft too
Jules
fastone is really good but i think he need a video viewer to be number one (like xnview)
a lot of camera use picture and video, and it's a problem with fastone to not see all files (only pictures)
i must use Xnview too but i really like fastone and i hope next update solve this problem
jules (france)
FastStone CAN show videos in several common formats. Maybe you have this feature disabled in the program.
Towards the center of the main screen toolbars you will see a small fly-out window which can be customized to show images only, videos only or both. Make sure you select the desired option there. Once you have done it you should be able to watch the videos by double clicking on the corresponding thumbnail.
Obviously the video viewer isn't as good as especially dedicated players, but basically it does the job.
Marc
Being a long time IrfanView user but animated by the comments here I gave XNView a shot. I like the program, espcially that it undoubtfully looks much better than IrfanView. The first thing I noticed is that I could not assign my file extension associations to XNView through the XNView options menu. Selecting the types I want and clicking Ok does not do the job. I did it manually. Second thing I noticed is that XNView is slower than IrfanView. I tried a few features and options and found them quite good. However, as a hard core IrfanView user I know all its short cuts and little tricks in- and outward and gave up on XNView facing the learning curve to be expected to handle it effectively. IrfanView stays my top choice and - btw - just hold the Ctrl key and you can quickly zoom in and out using the mouse wheel.
As I said in my review, when the products are good, the choice is a matter of personal convenience, mainly if you're already used to working with one of them. Irfan is fantastic and that's why it can be found in this list, and you know the program very well, too, so no wonder if you choose it as your favorite.
I hadn't noticed the bug you report with file associations in XN, but that shouldn't be a big problem.
I really appreciate the tip about zooming in Irfan. I've corrected the mistake.
Thanks for your contribution.
Marc
Faststone - the "crop board" function in Faststone is brilliant! If you have lots of images to crop before going off to the printer then Faststone is an absolute must...
Regards
BW
Faststone is still the best.
Cheers
Mario, Germany
oh.. and I forgot: keep an eye on:
http://labs.live.com/Seadragon.aspx
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ra5tp7K--I
it will be quite interesting...
best regards.
E.R.
I agree that Xnview should be No1 app. Perhaps this is the "best image viewer" but I will risk to say that any image viewer that lacks good browsing is not a good image viewer, as the browsing part is essential when it comes down to image tagging/organize. Then, if that's the case, you shouldn't use anything else besides the integrated windows fax/image viewer, as it has great speed and excellent zooming quality (something that even Xnview struggles with, it pixelates the images unless you use high quality zoom, and it is just a tad slow). Anyway, as for viewers go, you should also check out:
www.photomesa.com
http://kometbomb.net/projects/viewer2/
those have youtube videos to see them in action. Viewer2 is in early stage of developement, but it looks quite promising. Photomesa is more stable, and is a good choice to view, tag and organize your image collections in a zoomable user interface. These projects show the way image viewers/browsers are evolving.
Best regards.
E.R.
I've never noticed any zoom issues with XN, but maybe it's because my machines have always been fast enough.
I can't agree with what you say about the integrated Windows viewer because it is actually the one which has proved slower to me. Sure it is great for many cases, but not at all if you deal with bigger images (more about this topic in the comparative review of XN and FS below).
The other programs you mention have really appealing interfaces and their approaches to image viewing are innovative, but they also have some issues. In the case of Viewer2 there are still many bugs to solve, although it's a product to keep an eye on in future releases.
Photomesa looks very good, but it needs Microsoft NET Framework installed and that's a major caveat for many people (including me).
Seadragon is a great project too. I've been following it for years since I first heard about it, but I see it kind of bloated; simplicity and ease aren't the best words to apply to it, although performance can be impressive.
If you like to be presented with your pictures organized in different layouts and a wonderful looking way, then you might try ImageSorter. This one, however, isn't a real viewer, but more of an organizer and "reminder". I've found it very useful for some specific tasks.
http://mmk1.f4.fhtw-berlin.de/?page_id=88/
Overall, I think the recent trends in this category pay greater attention to the "fancy" interfaces and many new potential users will be attracted by this. But the classic ones still do a VERY good job in the field they're designed for, and if you're used to them, you'll probably stick to them.
Thanks for your contribution.
Marc
Oh, I will stick with XnView... that's for sure!!. I've always had fast machines as well, and I was refering to the difference in speed when you use the options/view/highqualityzoom/enlarge option in XnView. If you untick this, the zooming will be faster, but it will pixelate the image, if you use it, it will render a smoother image at the expense of speed; and this can be easily noticed using the scroll wheel to zoom in, since using + on the numpad will hide this as you are zooming in using steps. I've tried this in different machines, and when using the same image both in Windows fax/image viewer and XnView, the latter is slower when zooming in (past the 200+%). But anyway, this is nothing compared to what XnView has to give.
As for the other apps I mentioned, you are completely on spot. Viewer2 still has many many bugs, as I stated it is still in early stages of development, and photomesa, even though is quite more stable, lacks some other useful features. On a side note: may I ask why .NET framework is a "major" caveat? I ask because many of the freeware apps developed recently use this as a platform for coding, and I've never had any issues with it... and I do a lot of installing and uninstalling freeware on my machines... just to try it out or when I need something specific.
Yes, indeed these pay greater attention to the fancy side of the application... but in other words they interact quite nice with the user; and this is one of the first issues that developers are trying to solve with the new trend of software apps out there.
Keep up the great work on TechSupportAlert!!!
Best regards.
E.R.
You might also try this software called PHOTOSCAPE, its free and GOOD
I said older versions of PhotoScape were promising. Well, I've reviewed PhotoScape v.3 and I just keep saying the same because the program still lacks some capabilities that I consider essential and that were also missing before.
The interface is well designed, it's fast displaying images and thumbnails, and offers a lot of really nice features, apart from the most usual ones, for those who like to have everything at hand: a powerful editor, animated GIF builder, web page maker with many templates, a function for combining photos, exif removal, etc.
But I can't recommend it in my top list of viewers because there's no quick zooming and maximum zoom level is just 100%. Besides, thumbnails can't be resized to fit the user's needs and, finally, it supports only a few common formats, not including Photoshop's PSD's. These reasons alone make PhotoScape almost unusable for someone like me, but it can indeed satisfy many others with its nice extras.
Marc
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