Automatically grade and sort your photos by quality and subject — entirely on your own PC.
- Automatic star rating (1–5 ★) based on sharpness, exposure and composition
- AI subject sorting — copies photos into folders like People, Vehicles, Nature etc.
- Works with RAW files — CR2, CR3, NEF, ARW, ORF, DNG, RW2 and more
- 100% private — your photos never leave your computer
- Pause & resume — stop analysis and pick up where you left off
- Save progress — close the app and continue in a new session
- Sort & filter results by rating, sharpness, exposure or composition
Go to the Releases page and download PhotoRater.zip.
Unzip it — your folder should look like this:
PhotoRater\
PhotoRater.exe
README.txt
exiftool-13.58_64\
exiftool.exe
exiftool_files\
Ollama runs the AI model locally on your PC. Your photos never leave your computer.
- Download and install from https://ollama.com
- Open PowerShell and run:
This downloads the LLaVA vision model (~4.7 GB). You only need to do this once.
ollama pull llava
Double-click PhotoRater.exe and you're ready to go!
| Button | What it does |
|---|---|
| Browse | Pick your photo folder |
| ▶ Analyse | Start grading all photos |
| ⏸ Pause / Resume | Pause and continue at any time |
| 💾 Save Progress | Save and continue later |
| ✅ Save Ratings to Files | Write XMP star ratings into photo metadata |
| 📁 Sort into Folders | Use AI to copy photos into subject folders |
| 🔄 Reset | Clear results and start fresh |
Each photo is scored on three criteria:
| Criteria | Weight | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Sharpness | 40% | Laplacian edge variance — blurry photos score low |
| Exposure | 35% | Mid-tone brightness, contrast, penalises clipping |
| Composition | 25% | Rule-of-thirds edge distribution |
The scores are combined into a 1–5 star rating and written as XMP:Rating metadata — compatible with Lightroom, Capture One, Windows Photos and macOS Finder.
The AI sorting feature uses Ollama LLaVA to look at each photo and copy it into the best matching folder:
- 🐾 Animals
- 👥 People
- 🌿 Nature / Landscape
- 🏛️ Buildings / Architecture
- 🍕 Food
- 🚌 Vehicles
- 🏙️ Street / Urban
- ⚽ Sport
- 📦 Other
Originals are never moved or deleted — only copies are made.
- Windows 10 or 11 (64-bit)
- Ollama with LLaVA model (for subject sorting only)
- ExifTool (included in the download)
- ~500 MB disk space for the app
- ~5 GB disk space for the Ollama LLaVA model
This project is licensed under the MIT License — see the LICENSE file for details.
Found a bug or have a suggestion? Open an issue and I'll take a look!