Windows 10 users are dumbfounded that they cannot open HEIC image files. You are not alone with this situation. Due to the upgrade ofs ome Apple devices to iOS 11, it has been troublesome for Windows users.
High Efficiency Image Format also known as HEIC is a new image container format from the developers of MPEG. which is a popular audio an video compression standard. By default, HEIC will be the new default on iOS 11 and will be sharing sharing HEIC files as the default for JPEG formats for its apps. Users will not notice the difference if it is shared via Twitter or Instagram. iOS 11 also offers to automatically transfer photos and videos in a compatible format for Mac or PC users, useful if you’re simply plugging your iPhone into your laptop or PC.
This is a great leap when it comes to technology being used on iPhones since they iPhones have limited storage. The drawback is if you have a third-party app that backs up photos to a cloud storage. Google Photos and Dropbox to name a few, have already adapted using this new HEIC format within their apps, but Microsoft still has not. The latest version of OneDrive will convert HEIC to JPEG before performing an upload to the cloud. It is true that HEIC is not natively supported on Windows 10 but you do not have to have a dedicated photo app or a method to convert files in order to view your iPhone photos on a PC. You will be able to view them on OneDrive mobile apps, and in Windows 10. There are some instances of file transfers via Skype and other apps that the image is not viewable or downloadable but we all are expecting this to change in the near future.
If you are one of the users having issues with other cloud services, an online converter is available – click here. Another option is to disable HEIC, hence making the default images JPEG. It will force iOS 11 to store all images as JPEG. You can disable HEIC from settings > camera > formats. For people hot having issues, it is worth keeping, but if you are having difficulty better stick to JPEG for now. The beauty of it is in the near future the high efficiency mode enabled will save you valuable storage space.
