Image Metadata Viewer

About the Image Metadata Viewer

Photos carry hidden information: the camera or phone model, lens and exposure settings, the date and time, often the exact GPS location — and sometimes your name, a serial number or an editing history. This viewer reads all of it (Exif, GPS, IPTC, XMP, ICC colour profiles and PNG/WebP text) and explains in a plain-language Privacy check what the file reveals.

To share a picture without that data, use Download clean copy. For JPEG, PNG, WebP and GIF the metadata can be removed losslessly, without re-compressing the picture (animations are kept); other formats are re-encoded. Everything happens in your browser — the photo is never uploaded.

Common uses

• Checking a photo for location data before posting it, selling something online or sending it to a stranger.
• Finding out which camera, lens and settings were used for a picture you like.
• Checking the date and time a photo was taken.
• Verifying copyright, creator and caption fields (IPTC/XMP) before publishing.

What the metadata blocks are

• Exif — written by cameras and phones: make, model, lens, exposure, date and time, orientation and often GPS. It is defined by the CIPA/JEITA Exif standard, CIPA DC-008 (CIPA).
• GPS — part of Exif: latitude, longitude, altitude, a timestamp and sometimes the direction the camera faced.
• IPTC — captions, keywords, creator, copyright and place names used by news agencies and photo libraries (IPTC Photo Metadata).
• XMP — an XML format from Adobe (standardised as ISO 16684) that editors such as Lightroom and Photoshop use for ratings, edit settings and history (Adobe XMP).
• ICC profile — describes the colour space (for example sRGB or Display P3) so colours look right. It does not identify you.

Why the location matters

When the camera app has location access, phones store the exact position in every photo — often accurate to a few metres. Many social networks remove metadata when you upload, but email attachments, cloud-storage links, “send as file/document” options in chat apps and many websites pass on the original file, location included.

To stop new photos from recording it, turn off location access for the camera: on iPhone this is under Location Services (Apple’s guide); on Android look for a “Location tags” or “Save location” setting in the camera app.

Lossless removal or re-encoding?

• Lossless (JPEG, PNG, WebP, GIF): metadata blocks are removed and the compressed picture data is copied unchanged, so there is no quality loss, the format stays the same and animations keep playing. The orientation tag is written back (so the photo stays upright) and the colour profile is kept (so colours stay accurate). Extra data after the end of the image — such as embedded depth maps or vendor trailers — is removed too.
• Re-encode (any format your browser can open, including HEIC in Safari, AVIF and TIFF): the picture is drawn again and saved as a new JPEG, PNG or WebP with no metadata at all. This can slightly change quality and converts colours to sRGB.

Either way, the tool reads the new file again and confirms that no Exif, GPS, XMP, IPTC, comments or thumbnails remain.

Limitations

• Maker notes (camera-brand-specific binary data inside Exif) are not decoded; they are removed together with the rest of the Exif data.
• HEIC, TIFF and AVIF metadata can be read in any browser, but the preview and the re-encoded clean copy need a browser that can open the format (HEIC and TIFF: Safari).
• Metadata inside BMP, ICO and SVG files is not read (the tool says so instead of giving an all-clear); such files can still be cleaned by re-encoding.
• Exif, GPS or XMP data that is damaged, or stored in a way this tool can’t decode, is listed in the privacy check as “Metadata that could not be read” rather than ignored.
• Re-encoding keeps only the first frame of an animation; use Lossless for animated GIF, PNG and WebP files.
• RAW camera files are read only when they use a TIFF-based layout (for example DNG); other RAW formats are not supported.
• Removing metadata does not hide what the picture shows: landmarks, street signs or reflections can still reveal where it was taken.

Privacy

Your image is read by your browser and is not uploaded or stored anywhere. The only thing that can leave your device is the location — and only if you click View on OpenStreetMap, which opens openstreetmap.org with the coordinates.