Windows HEIC Thumbnail Provider

Windows 10 does not support HEIC files by default, which are the native photo image format of recent iPhones.

HEIC files are similar to JPEG files, but with better quality in half the file size.

This small shell extension adds the ability for Windows Explorer to display thumbnails of .heic or .heif files.

To open or edit HEIC files you'll still need another application such as Paint.NET or Krita.

Installing

• Requires Windows 10 (64-bit)

• Install the latest Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable, if required. You may already have this installed, but if you get an error when you run the regsvr32 command, install this and then try again.

• Create a folder, such as C:\HEICThumbnailHandler\ to place the DLL files.

• Download the latest release of HEICThumbnailHandler.
• Extract the files HEICThumbnailHandler.dll, heif.dll, and libde265.dll into the folder you created (C:\HEICThumbnailHandler\).
• Register the DLL:
  • Press Win+R
  • Type cmd
  • Click OK
  • Type cd C:\HEICThumbnailHandler\
  • Type regsvr32 HEICThumbnailHandler.dll

Windows Explorer should begin displaying thumbnails for .heic and .heif files.

Uninstalling

1. Un-Register the DLL:
   • Press Win+R
   • Type cmd
   • Click OK
   • Type cd C:\HEICThumbnailHandler\
   • Type regsvr32 /u HEICThumbnailHandler.dll
2. Delete the HEICThumbnailHandler folder.

Existing thumbnails may continue to display, but new thumbnails will not be created.

Building

This project was built with Visual Studio 2022.

Requires libheif which can be installed with vcpkg.

vcpkg install libheif:x64-windows

Optionally use the included vcpkg overlay which removes the dependancy on the x265 encoder, a 5MB dll which is not used.

vcpkg install libheif:x64-windows --overlay-ports=..\windows-heic-thumbnails\vcpkg-overlay