By default, when you double-click on a photo in Windows, the default photo viewer opens, beautiful, essential, but certainly not the best available. Let's see how to change this behavior and make sure that when you click on an image it opens with our favorite program (and then we will see which is the best to use).
In general, I had already talked about this topic by explaining how to change file associations with the default programs in Windows .
There are basically two easy ways to choose which program to open a photo with or any other type of file.
In Windows 7 you can edit you can change the program that is used when you open a specific type of file from the Control Panel, going to Default Programs in the Programs section.
You can then make your choice in two different ways by pressing Set default programs or by associating a file type with a program .
The first option displays a list of the various programs installed on your computer .
You can then check, for each program, what type of file it opens and if you want and change the associations by placing the crosses on the files you want.
If you want to use a different program to open photos on your PC, whatever format they are, select it from the list and press Set as default program .
The second option is the reverse, from the list of file extensions, you can configure, for each, the program to use.
Speaking of images and photos, the most popular file formats to consider are Jpg, Jpeg, bmp, png, tiff and gif .
Then press on program modification, to obtain a list of recommended programs with the possibility to browse other programs not present in the list.
The advantage of this method is that you can choose any program to open a file while in the first method only the programs installed and registered in Windows are listed, missing the portable ones that do not require installation.
You can also access this same window by right-clicking on any file in Windows Explorer, from the Open With menu > choose program .
In this regard, we addressed and solved in another article the problem of a file that does not open, unknown extension or if it uses the wrong program
In Windows 8 and Windows 10 in the list of various programs there are also applications from the Microsoft store.
Also be aware that there is no way to restore the default programs to their original values from when Windows was installed so be careful.
Finally, note that all the settings are stored specifically for the user who uses the computer, therefore, for other profiles, there may be different associations.
What is the best program for opening photos on a Windows PC "> best programs for viewing images and photos on the PC, the most comfortable and the one that everyone should set as default is Irfanview.
