6 Free Image Viewer Alternatives

Windows ships with an image viewer that gets the job done for some users, but if you want a few more options you should check out alternative free image viewer software that add features or make tasks simpler.

1. Irfanview: Even though its name looks a bit strange to you, it’s probably one of the most powerful image viewers which makes it my favorite among all free alternative image viewer. This photo viewer works on all versions of windows like Windows ME, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Window 7, Windows NT.  Irfanview is not only more powerful; it is much faster and takes only small amount of memory to run. The full version is free so you won’t need to deal with limits or a trial running out.

Irfanview supports many file formats like BMP, JPG, GIF, TIFF, PSD, EPS, PNG, PCX and lot more.  Irfanview doesn’t only show you your images, it also gives you other notable features which are not available with the standard Windows image viewer; like resizing, change of color depth and effects like sharpen or blur to name a few.

Some of its popular features are

• Many supported file formats
• Multi language support
• Thumbnail/preview option
• Paint option – to draw lines, circles, arrows, straighten image etc.
• Toolbar skins option
• Slideshow (save slideshow as EXE/SCR or burn it to CD)
• Show EXIF/IPTC/Comment text in Slideshow/Fullscreen etc.
• Support for Adobe Photoshop Filters
• Fast directory view (moving through directory)
• Batch conversion (with image processing)
• Multipage TIF editing

2. FastStone image Viewer: Another alternative to the Windows photo viewer is the FastStone Image viewer. This image viewer software has some extra features including red-eye removal, image resizing, color adjustments, watermark, drop shadows, framing and lot more.

This image viewer supports many file formats like BMP, JPEG, JPEG 2000, animated GIF, PNG, PCX, TIFF, WMF, ICO etc. It also supports all popular digital camera Raw formats (CRW, CR2, NEF, PEF, RAF, MRW, ORF, SRF and DNG). This software also includes high quality magnifier and a musical slideshow with around 150+ transitional effects. This software is free for home users without any adware.

3. XnView: XnView is another good alternative compare to your traditional window image viewer. XnView is available free for private non-commercial or educational use. XnView comes with some features which window Image viewer doesn’t provide like comparing images side by side, batch rename, screen capture, adjust brightness, color contrast, resizing images, applying filters, converting any graphics file to more than 50 formats etc. Xnview supports about 400 graphic file formats.

Some of its popular features are

• Import about 400 graphic file formats.
• Export about 50 graphic file formats.
• Multipage TIFF, Animated GIF, Animated ICO support
• Image IPTC, EXIF metadata support
• EXIF auto rotation support
• IPTC editing
• Resize, rotate, crop support
• Lossless rotate & crop (jpeg) support
• Adjust brightness, contrast.
• Auto levels, contrast
• Apply filters (blur, average, emboss, …)
• Apply effects (lens, wave, …)

4. WilBit Viewer: Wildbit Image viewer is a fast, simple and easy to use image viewer. Some of its key features are side by side image comparison, thumbnail view, image information in thumbnail view, slide show with around 172 transitional effects, rotate, zoom, Raw support, image marking and red eye removal.

5. Imagine: Imagine is another alternative fast and easy image viewer. Some of its popular features include support for zip, RAR, 7z file, capture screen, batch conversion, image editing, color swapping, shell extension support, add-on/plugin support, more than 100 file format supports, slidesshow and lot more.

Some of its key features are listed below:

• Support for numerous image/animation file formats: GIF, BMP, PNG, JPG, TIF, TGA, PCX, ICO, ANI, FLI, and many more…
• Extract single/all frames from animation files
• Show detailed information of image/animation files
• Show EXIF information
• Show or hide transparency
• Support ZIP, RAR, 7z, alz, HV3 file
• Unicode support
• Multilingual support:
• Thumbnail browser
• Capture screen
• Slideshow

6. PIctoMio: Pictomio is another free program to view images, but it’s real strength comes in displaying your 3D-accelerated photos and video collections. PictoMio also comes with great geo tagging features.

PhotCredit: Snapfiles & software author site