SageThumbs: Free Windows Explorer Extension to Show Thumbnail Previews and Convert Many Popular Image Formats

As we all know we can show thumbnail previews for image files in Windows Explorer to view or identify the image without opening it. But by default Windows can’t show thumbnail previews for all image file formats. There are a few file formats like PSD, TIFF, TGA and XCF which can’t be previewed by Windows Explorer.

Wouldn’t it be great if we could see thumbnail previews for almost all image files in Windows Explorer? Don’t worry! Today we are going to share an absolutely free and small extension for Windows Explorer which allows you to show thumbnail previews for many unsupported file formats in Windows Explorer.

SageThumbs” is an excellent shell extension for Windows which allows you to preview almost all image file formats in Windows Explorer. It uses popular image viewer XnView’s GFL library for this task.

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Sage_Thumbs_Windows_Explorer_Thumbnail_Preview.png

Along with showing thumbnail previews, it also allows you to convert an image format to another which is an extra benefit of using this small utility. You can convert an image format into JPG, GIF, PNG and BMP file formats.

You can even see an image file thumbnail preview in its context menu, Just right-click on an image file and you’ll see its thumbnail preview in context menu.

You can also set the image file as Desktop wallpaper by right-click on it and select the desired option. You can also select the wallpaper type (stretched, tiled, centered).

Sage_Thumbs_Context_Menu_Options.png

This extension adds some detailed information in image files tool-tips. Whenever you hover the mouse cursor over an image file, you can see extra info like resolution DPI, compression format, colors, etc in its tool-tip.

If you want, you can enable / disable a particular image file format to be previewed by SageThumbs using its Options window. You can also disable its context menu entry, thumbnails in Explorer or customize thumbnail size, conversion options, etc using its Settings.

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Sage_Thumbs_Settings.png

Features List:

  • Extended thumbnail image view of Explorer folder
  • Thumbnail image in explorer context menu
  • Extended info tips
  • Support 162 image formats (224 extensions)
  • Support additional 26 image formats via XnView plugins
  • One-click conversion to popular image formats support
  • Wallpaper selection support
  • Copy to clipboard support

This extension can be installed in Windows 2000, XP, Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003 and 2008. Both 32-bit and 64-bit editions are supported.

You can download it using following link:

Download SageThumbs

Thanks to our reader “Vicky S” for sharing it…

Published in: Software, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP

About the author: Vishal Gupta (also known as VG) has been awarded with Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award. He holds Masters degree in Computer Applications (MCA). He has written several tech articles for popular newspapers and magazines and has also appeared in tech shows on various TV channels.

Comments

NOTE: Older comments have been removed to reduce database overhead.

  1. External plugins

    SageThumbs can use external XnView plugins, it tries to automatically detect XnView installation folder or if failed it will use predefined folder. Typically this folder is “C:\Program files\XnView\PlugIns\” for 32-bit SageThumbs on 32-bit Windows or 64-bit SageThumbs on 64-bit Windows and “C:\Program Files (x86)\XnView\PlugIns\” for 32-bit SageThumbs on 64-bit Windows. So if you have no XnView installed you can create this folder manually and unpack plugins to it. Just don’t forget that you need same “bit capacity” for plugins and SageThumbs.

    @VG
    some note on the page

    This is great! Windows 8 should come with these.

  2. OMG this is great. I love that I can have a thumbnail preview for PSD files now. And I love love love the thumbnails as icons!!! I always used Xentient Thumbnails until I switched to windows 7. But SageThumbs won’t show my PSD thumbnails as icons – I still just see the file icon. I use IrfanView as my default image viewer – except for PSD files which I open with GIMP instead. SageThumbs seems to have an issue with this because, if I change my PSD files to open with IrfanView, SageThumbs shows the thumbnail (as an icon). As soon as I change it back to open with GIMP, SageThumbs goes back to displaying the file icon.

  3. Pity there isn’t something like this for htm\html thumbnails like what IE6 for win98 and older IEs could do in explorer.

  4. haha yes you stars i was stressing over this problem with windows 8 you ledgends lol

  5. Man if only this converted to .ico =) Awesome little utility thanks for the share mate =)

  6. Great !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I waited so long. so I took precious time opening files in Photoshop I can now easily view files!! T H A N K S.

  7. This didn’t work for me. I have tried several different options and nothing has worked to allow me to see my PSD thumbs. It changed what the thumbnail looks like but it isn’t showing me the image.

    Thanks anyway.

  8. If anyone in Windows 10 is getting weird icons in the metro apps, just unmark the extension “png” and use the disk cleanup to clean the thumbnails cache, then maybe a restart will be required.

  9. Sage Thumbs was working just fine, now all my cr2 thumbnails are pink and I can’t see the image very well. Anyone else having a problem? I did the Repair Sage Thumbs and it didn’t fix the problem. I’m running Win7 and Sage Thumbs v2.0.0.22.

  10. How long have I been looking for this program! The best software and only one (as far as I know) to show the file type icon on thumbnail. It’s a huge help me, when I’m working.

    Work perfect on Win7 64bit.

    keep up the good work guys!

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