Online HEIC viewer

Q: What about HEIF, HIF, and AVIF?

`.heif` and `.hif` are the generic spellings of the same HEVC container and view identically. `.avif` is refused honestly — it compresses with AV1 and this build has no AV1 decoder, so pretending to support it would just show an error after you waited.

View iPhone HEIC photos at full resolution — libheif compiled to WebAssembly decodes each one in this tab, with zoom, folder browsing, and a lightbox. Photos never leave your device.

Load from cloud

Drop HEIC photos (or a zip of them) anywhere on this page

The HEVC decode runs entirely in your browser. Photos never leave your device.

A HEIC that opens instantly on a Mac or iPhone is, on most Windows and Linux machines, a file nothing will display — the HEVC codec inside it is patent-licensed, and browser makers without a license ship without a decoder. An online viewer sounds like the fix, but the usual one uploads your photos to a server and shows you the render. This page is the other kind: the decoder — libheif compiled to WebAssembly — runs inside your tab, and the photos stay on your device the whole time.

The viewer is built for inspecting, not just displaying: every photo decodes at full resolution with zoom and pan, ←/→ walks the folder’s HEICs in order, the lightbox shows the whole folder as a grid, and — the part upload viewers cannot offer — HEICs inside a zip open straight from the archive’s file tree without extracting anything. Press F12 → Network while you browse: the only fetch is the one-time engine (~1 MB, this site’s own domain), and no request ever carries a photo.

How to view HEIC files online

Nothing to install, nothing to sign up for:

Drop your .heic photos anywhere on this page — or the zip they came in — or press Try an example photo first.
Click a photo in the file list: it decodes to full resolution (the first open also fetches the engine, once, then it is cached).
Zoom with the wheel, pinch, or double-click; pan by dragging; + / − / 0 work from the keyboard. Past 1.5× a small overview minimap appears so you always know which part of the photo you are looking at.
← and → browse the folder’s other HEICs; the lightbox button shows the whole folder as a grid of real thumbnails.

A viewer, not a converter (both exist here)

This page is for looking: checking what a photo actually shows, culling a shoot, verifying the contents of an album export before unpacking it. When you do want a JPEG out of it, the viewer’s status bar offers Download .jpg — and the dedicated HEIC to JPG converter page covers that intent end to end, same engine, same privacy model.

What viewing-only buys you is speed and range: no export dialog in the way, thumbnails for whole folders (a mixed folder of HEIC and JPG/PNG renders as one grid — HEICs decode through libheif, plain images through the browser), and every HEIC in an archive browsable without extracting a single file.

HEIC inside zips — the signature trick

Photos rarely travel as loose files; they arrive in archives — an iPhone backup, a shared-album export, a developer’s asset bundle. Most online viewers make you extract everything first, then upload the photos one by one. Here the zip IS the workflow: drop it, the file tree opens, and clicking a .heic decodes it straight out of the archive. The archive’s search also lists every HEIC by name, so a thousand-photo backup stays navigable.

That is the structural advantage of decoding locally: the archive never has to be uploaded or unpacked for one photo to be seen.

Honest limits

Real capability, real boundaries — stated up front.

EXIF is not displayed — dimensions are; shooting metadata (date, camera, GPS) is kept in the file but not rendered as a panel in this version.
Multi-image HEICs (bursts, tile grids) show the primary still; Live Photo video halves are ignored.
`.heif`/`.hif` view identically (same container); `.avci` (AVC) views on Safari, which decodes it natively; `.avif` is refused — AV1 payload, no decoder in this build.
One-time engine download (~1 MB) from this site's own domain, cached by your browser; viewing works offline afterwards. On Safari 17+ there is no engine at all — your browser already decodes HEIC natively.
Display P3 colors are converted to sRGB in the decode, so iPhone photos render with their intended tones instead of an oversaturated cast.
Size caps (64 MB per file) keep the tab responsive.

Credits

The decode engine is libheif with its libde265 HEVC decoder (both LGPL-3.0), distributed via libheif-js as WebAssembly and served from this site’s own domain as a standalone, replaceable file. This page adds the viewer, zoom, folder browsing, and the archive integration; libheif does the decoding.

Frequently asked questions

How can I view HEIC files online without uploading them?

Drop them on this page. The viewer decodes HEIC in your browser via libheif compiled to WebAssembly — the engine downloads once (~1 MB, from this site’s own domain), and from then on photos open locally. You can disconnect from the internet after the page loads and viewing keeps working.

Why won’t my computer open HEIC files?

HEIC photos compress with HEVC, and decoding HEVC in software touches a patent pool. Apple licenses it, so Macs and iPhones render HEIC natively; most Windows and Linux setups ship without a decoder (Microsoft’s HEVC extension is a paid/partial install). A WebAssembly decoder sidesteps the issue — it arrives as ordinary data, not browser code.

Does the viewer show full resolution?

Yes — a real decode of the photo’s HEVC data, not the small preview thumbnail HEIC files carry. Zoom in: wheel, pinch, double-click, or the +/− keys. The first photo takes a moment while the engine initializes and decodes; neighbours in a folder load as you browse.

Can I view HEIC photos inside a zip?

Yes — drop the zip instead of loose photos. The archive’s file tree opens, and clicking a HEIC decodes it straight from inside, no extraction step. Name search works over the archive too, so large photo backups stay navigable.

What about HEIF, HIF, and AVIF?

.heif and .hif are the generic spellings of the same HEVC container and view identically. .avif is refused honestly — it compresses with AV1 and this build has no AV1 decoder, so pretending to support it would just show an error after you waited.

Can I download a HEIC as JPG from the viewer?

Yes — the status bar’s Download .jpg exports the exact decode you are viewing (EXIF metadata does not travel with it). For conversion as the main task, the HEIC to JPG page is the dedicated tool, and its toolbar button batch-converts a whole folder’s HEICs (up to 50 per run) into one zip.