OpenImage Viewer

Fast advanced image viewer for Chrome & Edge

OpenImage Viewer is a community-maintained fork inspired by the original BetterViewer project. It preserves the existing UI/UX and toolset while adding a Manifest V3-compatible hybrid detection architecture that restores automatic image-tab opening in modern Chromium browsers.

Why this fork exists

When Chromium moved from MV2 to MV3, automatic behavior for “Open image in new tab” became unreliable in many image viewer extensions.

This fork solves that with a hybrid approach:

• URL-based image detection
• File extension detection
• MIME/content-type detection from response headers
• Navigation event detection
• Direct image-tab DOM detection
• Automatic redirect to the viewer page

Fallback remains available:

• Right-click image → Open Image in OpenImage Viewer

Features

• Zoom in / zoom out / 1:1 / reset
• Fullscreen
• Rotate / flip
• Crop image
• Photo editor
• Annotate image
• Color picker
• Download image
• Image details (EXIF/metadata)
• QR scanner
• Reverse image search
• Photopea integration
• Keyboard shortcuts and toolbar customization

Screenshots

Installation

Local development

pnpm install
pnpm dev

Build packages

pnpm build:chrome
pnpm build

MV3 compatibility notes

This extension is built on Manifest V3 and uses a layered detection strategy to preserve auto-open behavior for direct image tabs in Chromium-based browsers.

It keeps permissions focused on what is required for:

• tab/navigation tracking
• content-type checks
• context menu fallback
• local state storage

Keyboard shortcuts

Default shortcuts include:

• + / - / 0 for zoom controls
• Shift + Arrow for rotation
• Ctrl + E editor
• Ctrl + X crop
• Shift + C color picker
• Ctrl + D download
• Ctrl + I image details

Supported image formats

Common formats include:

• JPG / JPEG / PNG / GIF / WEBP
• SVG / BMP / ICO
• AVIF
• TIFF / TIF
• APNG / JFIF / PJPEG / PJP
• HEIC / HEIF (site/browser support dependent)

Known limitations

• Some websites intentionally block direct image access via headers/CSP.
• HEIC/HEIF behavior depends on browser decoding support.
• Firefox MV3 behavior may differ from Chromium behavior.

Roadmap

• Refine Firefox-specific image-tab detection
• Add automated end-to-end regression tests for redirect flow
• Add refreshed store assets and icon set for OpenImage Viewer branding
• Improve onboarding and in-app settings UX

Attribution

• Inspired by / based on: BetterViewer (original open-source project)
• License: MIT
• Icon attribution: Icons made by Graphics Plazza from Flaticon

Credits

OpenImage Viewer is a community-maintained fork inspired by the original BetterViewer project by Adem Kouki.

Original project: https://github.com/Ademking/BetterViewer

Includes additional Manifest V3 compatibility improvements and modern Chromium support.

Contributors

Community-maintained. Contributions are welcome via pull requests and issues.

License

MIT License. See LICENSE.