EXIF Viewer

What a full EXIF record can tell you

EXIF is genuinely informative when it survives. A complete record identifies the camera body and lens, the exposure triangle used for the shot, whether the flash fired, the focal length, the orientation the camera was held at, the software that last wrote the file, and the exact second of capture.

For photographers this is a learning tool: seeing the settings behind a shot you like is the fastest way to understand how it was made. For anyone verifying an image, the capture timestamp and the device identity are often more decisive than any watermark check, because they are hard to fake consistently across a whole set of files.

The software field deserves particular attention. It records the last application that wrote the file, which frequently reveals that an image described as an untouched original has in fact been through an editor.

• Make, model, and lens — the equipment used.
• Exposure time, aperture, ISO, focal length — how the shot was taken.
• DateTimeOriginal — when the shutter actually fired, distinct from file modification time.
• Software — the last application to write the file.
• GPS latitude, longitude, and sometimes altitude — where it was taken.

The privacy problem hiding in your camera roll

Phones geotag by default in most configurations, and the coordinates they record are precise enough to identify a specific building. A photo taken in your living room and posted publicly carries your home address in a field almost nobody checks.

The risk compounds across a set of images. One geotagged photo reveals a location. A dozen reveal a routine: where you live, where you work, what time you leave, where your children go to school.

Most large social platforms strip this on upload, which has quietly protected a lot of people. But direct file sharing does not — email attachments, cloud folder links, forum uploads, and messaging apps in document mode all preserve the original file intact.

Why timestamps disagree with each other

A single image can carry three different times and they routinely differ. DateTimeOriginal is when the shutter fired. DateTimeDigitized is when the image was digitised, which is the same moment for a digital camera but not for a scan. DateTime is when the file was last modified.

A gap between DateTimeOriginal and DateTime simply means the file was edited or re-saved after capture, which is completely ordinary. A DateTimeOriginal that postdates the event the image supposedly documents is a much more interesting finding.

Also be aware that many cameras record local time with no timezone at all, so comparing timestamps across devices or against a known event requires knowing how each device was configured.

Why this viewer refuses to upload your file

Most free online EXIF viewers work by uploading your photo to a server, parsing it there, and returning the result. That is an unnecessary transfer of a file that may contain your home coordinates, your face, or your client's confidential work, to a party whose retention policy you have not read.

Browsers can parse metadata perfectly well on their own. This page uses an open-source parser running in your tab, so the bytes of your photo never leave your device. There is no upload endpoint on this site to send them to.

The practical consequence is that this tool keeps working with sensitive material — unreleased client work, evidence, personal photographs — where uploading to an unknown service would not be acceptable.

When the record is empty or obviously wrong

Empty means the file passed through something that strips metadata. That is most of the internet. It is not suspicious on its own.

Wrong is more interesting. Metadata is unsigned, so every field can be edited. A mismatch between the claimed camera and the image characteristics, a capture date that predates the camera model, or a software field naming a tool the photographer denies using are all worth following up.

None of these are proof by themselves. They are the kind of inconsistency that tells you which question to ask next.