If you haven’t come across these file formats already, you probably will soon. Created by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) and adopted by Apple amongst others, it’s looking like a replacement for the old JPEG image format.

The format was added in iOS11 and created when doing things like taking a photo. Early on the files were being converted back to JPEG in many situations, including OneDrive Photo Roll syncs.

I expect something else has changed recently, as I’m seeing the files turn up over email from other parties where I’d never seen them before. If I find out more I’ll update this post.

.HEIC and .HEIF files ‘appear’ to be the same thing, but at this stage I can’t clearly find information explaining if there’s a difference, and if so what that is.

These files can’t be natively opened on Windows 11 or earlier, but there’s a few options you have to view them.

OneDrive

If you have access to OneDrive or OneDrive for Business (which doesn’t take much, a free Microsoft account will do), you can copy these files into OneDrive, right click and ‘View Online’. Via your browser, you can then view the image in OneDrive without any extra software required. However, Microsoft documentation currently does not list the formats as being supported, and I’m also asking questions about this in a few areas. (Update 3rd March 2020 – Microsoft updated this page after I asked :) )

Windows 10 & 11

The native Photos app was supposed to have support for this as per these Insider Build notes. I’ve tested on a few different PCs including a fully patched standard Microsoft build laptop, and Photos doesn’t recognise the files. I’ve been told the support of the files needs the two Windows Store apps, and that matches my testing:

HEIF Image Extensions

HEVC Video Extensions from the Device Manufacturer

Both are created by ‘Microsoft Corporation’ so they’re not third party, and both are free. Once installed, HEIC and HEIF files work everywhere I’ve tried, including in the native Photos app.

There is also a paid HEVC Video Extensions version from Microsoft that costs $1.45AU, I’m not sure why you’d need this one over the one ‘from the Device Manufacturer’.

Frustratingly, the ‘HEVC Video Extensions from the Device Manufacturer’ app doesn’t seem to be available to add in Windows Store for Business, but the HEIF Image Extensions is. I’m asking around to try and have that resolved, if I can find someone to listen to me :) (Update 3rd March 2020 – this probably won’t change anytime soon for licensing reasons)

Converting

One final option is to convert a HEIC to JPEG. Here’s a quick guide using Linux via a Debian WSL image, installed from the Microsoft Store (thanks Purana for the tip!)

I’ve got a lot of unanswered questions in the above, but hoping this at least helps others that might get stuck in finding a working solution in the meantime.