Best Of

Best Of: Best Free Image Viewer

Are you getting sick of the limited features Windows Photo Gallery brings you? Quite frankly I am, Thats why I have always used an alternative image viewer as it just gave me headaches trying to sort out my images properly and the lack of features was frustrating.All though many of you won’t care about an image viewer/editor, the ones who are avid amateur photographers will enjoy these applications as it will help them sort out the tons of pictures they usually take, and give them better features for more advance image options.

1) FastStone Image Viewer: FastStone Image Viewer is a fast, stable, user-friendly image browser, viewer converter and editor with an easy to use interface and a nice array of features, that include resizing, renaming, high quality magnifier, built-in slideshow with 150+ transitional effects, drop shadow effects, image annotation, scanner support, histogram, cropping, color adjustments, watermarks, management, comparison, red-eye removal, emailing, resizing, cropping, color adjustments and more.It also includes an intuitive full-screen mode that provides quick access to EXIF information, thumbnail browser and major functionalities via hidden toolbars that pop up when you touch the edge of your screen with the mouse.Currently supports 18 image formats.

2) IrfanView: IrfanView is the most popular and feature packed free image viewer for Windows.Apart from image browsing some of its features include slideshow, batch conversion, image adjustment, image editing, multi-language support, multipage editing, file search, change color depth, scanning, cut/crop, IPTC edit, capturing, lossless JPG operations, resizing, panorama stitching, auto EXIF rotation and more.Apart from all that it provides further customizability by allow you to download plugins from their wide library.So why is it number 2 on my countdown list? The interface lacks behind modern image viewers that often offer more user friendly operation and better thumbnail browsing features. With IrfanView even some basic features like EXIF display, lossless rotation etc. require you to download and install additional plug-ins. There certainly are more user-friendly and attractive image viewers, but few that offer all the functionality, and extendibility that IrfanView can provide.

3) Xnview: Xnview is a fast multi-format image viewer and converter.It supports more than 400 graphics formats and offers many additional features. You can apply filters and effects to your images, import from a twain source (scanner, camera) or use the thumbnail picture browser to explore your image collection. Xnview`s strongest feature is the support for a huge amount of file formats, and the option to convert among them. It also offers many other features, including customizable screen layout, screen capture, slide show and much more. You can also create web pages from your images, create contact sheets, generate file listings and manage your file by move and copy.Xnview is a well established and feature packed imaging tool.

Respected Contenders: Vallen Jpegger, Visualizer Photo Resize, PicWalker, Free DWG Viewer, AI Picture Explorer.

Also Read:

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• Best Of: Best Free Photo Editor
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