Default Image Viewing Tools in Windows 98

Microsoft Windows 98 included several built-in utilities that allowed users to open, view, and preview digital images without installing third-party software. While the operating system preceded modern, dedicated photo apps like the Windows Photo Viewer found in later releases, it relied on a combination of basic graphics editors, licensed document viewers, internet tools, and shell-level file previews to handle standard image formats such as BMP, JPEG, GIF, and TIFF.

Imaging for Windows

The primary dedicated image viewer included with Windows 98 was Imaging for Windows (built by Eastman Software, formerly Wang Laboratories). Located in the Accessories menu, this program was designed for viewing, annotating, and scanning documents and images. It natively supported formats such as TIFF, BMP, and PCX, and was particularly useful for multi-page TIFF files and basic optical scanning tasks.

Microsoft Paint

Microsoft Paint (mspaint.exe) served as the operating system's default raster graphics editor and secondary image viewer. While primarily a drawing program, Paint was frequently used to view single-frame images. In Windows 98, Paint could open and save native bitmap (.bmp) files, and with the installation of graphics filters included with components like Internet Explorer or Microsoft Office, it gained support for viewing JPEG and GIF formats.

Internet Explorer

Because Windows 98 integrated Internet Explorer deep into the operating system, the browser acted as a standard fallback viewer for common web graphic formats. Image types such as JPEG, GIF, and PNG were often registered to open automatically inside Internet Explorer when clicked, providing reliable rendering for standard web images that tools like basic Paint could not always handle natively.

Quick View

Windows 98 included an optional utility called Quick View, available through the Windows Setup options in the Control Panel. When installed, users could right-click an image file in Windows Explorer and select "Quick View" to open a lightweight, read-only preview window for formats like BMP and other standard graphic types without launching the full associated application.

Windows Explorer Thumbnail and Web View

Windows 98 introduced an integrated Active Desktop shell that offered image previewing directly within folder windows. By enabling "as Web Page" view or switching a folder to "Thumbnails" view, users could click on an image file to view an instant rendering in the left-hand preview pane or see small preview tiles of supported image files directly in the directory.