What is an EXIF viewer?
An EXIF viewer reads the metadata a camera or phone writes into a photo file, such as the device make and model, when the picture was taken, the exposure settings and where it was taken. EXIF (Exchangeable image file format) is a standard published by Japan's CIPA and JEITA. This viewer shows the common EXIF fields stored in a JPEG, without uploading it.
EXIF data sits inside the file next to the pixels, in a block called the APP1 segment. Most image viewers hide it. The full format is defined in the CIPA DC-008 Exif specification.
How to view a photo's EXIF data
- Click Choose File and pick a
.jpgor.jpegphoto. - Click View.
- The fields found appear in the output box, one per line, which you can copy.
For example, a JPEG straight from a camera with location tagging on might show:
Make: Canon
Model: Canon EOS R6
Orientation: 6
DateTime: 2026:05:14 11:02:45
DateTimeOriginal: 2026:05:14 09:32:10
ExposureTime: 1/250 s
FNumber: f/2.8
ISOSpeedRatings: 400
FocalLength: 50 mm
PixelXDimension: 6000
PixelYDimension: 4000
GPSLatitude: 51.504250
GPSLongitude: -0.127667
Dates use EXIF's own YYYY:MM:DD HH:MM:SS format, with colons in the date as well as the time, and no time zone. Here the photo was taken at 09:32 and the file was edited later the same morning, which is why the two dates differ.
Fields this viewer reads
EXIF organizes tags into directories called IFDs. The main directory, IFD0, holds a few general fields plus links to two sub-directories, and the viewer follows both links:
| Field | Directory | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Make | IFD0 | Manufacturer of the camera or phone |
| Model | IFD0 | Device model name |
| Orientation | IFD0 | How to rotate the image for display (see below) |
| DateTime | IFD0 | Date and time the file was last changed |
| ImageWidth / ImageHeight | IFD0 | Pixel dimensions, if recorded there (rare in JPEGs) |
| DateTimeOriginal | Exif | Date and time the photo was taken |
| ExposureTime | Exif | Shutter speed, such as 1/250 s |
| FNumber | Exif | Aperture, such as f/2.8 |
| ISOSpeedRatings | Exif | Sensor sensitivity (ISO) |
| FocalLength | Exif | Lens focal length in millimetres |
| PixelXDimension / PixelYDimension | Exif | Width and height of the stored image |
| GPSLatitude / GPSLongitude | GPS | Location in decimal degrees |
Fields a file doesn't contain are simply left out. Maker notes (each manufacturer's private data) and less common tags, such as lens model or GPS altitude, aren't decoded.
GPS coordinates
EXIF stores a position as degrees, minutes and seconds, each a fraction, plus a reference letter: N or S for latitude, E or W for longitude. The viewer converts that to decimal degrees using degrees + minutes ÷ 60 + seconds ÷ 3600, and makes the value negative for S and W.
In the example above, the file stores 51° 30′ 15.3″ N and 0° 7′ 39.6″ W. That's 51 + 30/60 + 15.3/3600 = 51.504250, and 0 + 7/60 + 39.6/3600 = 0.127667, made negative because it's west of Greenwich. Typing 51.504250, -0.127667 into most map apps drops a pin on that spot in central London. Six decimal places is roughly 10 cm of precision, finer than a phone's GPS actually achieves.
Orientation values
Cameras usually save pixels in the sensor's native landscape layout and record how the device was held. Viewers apply this tag to show the image upright. The values you're most likely to see are:
| Value | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 1 | Normal, no rotation |
| 3 | Rotate 180° |
| 6 | Rotate 90° clockwise |
| 8 | Rotate 90° counter-clockwise |
Values 2, 4, 5 and 7 add a mirror flip and are rare in camera output. The viewer prints the raw number, not the description.
Which files work
Only JPEG. The viewer checks for the JPEG start marker and then looks for an APP1 segment that starts with Exif. For a PNG, WebP, HEIC or any other format, it reports that no EXIF data was found, even though some of those formats can carry EXIF too. iPhone photos saved as HEIC need converting to JPEG first.
If you get "No EXIF metadata found" for a JPEG, the metadata was probably stripped already. Social platforms and messaging apps commonly do this on upload, and so does any tool that re-encodes an image through a canvas, including this site's image compressor and image resizer.
Privacy: check before you share
If GPS lines appear, anyone you send the original file to can see where it was taken. Run it through the EXIF remover, which rebuilds the image from pixels alone and so drops every metadata field, GPS included. Running the cleaned file back through this viewer should then show no EXIF at all. Keep in mind that this viewer only reads JPEG EXIF: location stored in XMP data or in another format isn't checked, so stripping the file is the safer option when location matters.
To add your own mark to a photo before posting it, use the watermark tool, which also outputs a file with no EXIF data.
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