Release notes

Highlights

• Fast gallery: a hardware-accelerated timeline that stays smooth even with very large libraries.
• Your folders, kept in sync: add folders and PhotoNest picks up new, changed and deleted files automatically.
• People: on-device face recognition groups photos by person.
• Smart search: find photos by describing them (“dog on the beach”) or by date, place and camera.
• Places and map: browse photos by location on a map.
• Memories: “on this day” and trip highlights from your library.
• Organise: favourites, albums, tags, archive and a 30-day trash.
• Clean up: find duplicates and large files and free up space.
• Locked Folder: keep private photos behind a separate password.
• Multiple users: each person gets their own profile and settings.
• Live and Motion photos: iPhone Live Photos and Android Motion Photos play as they should.
• Wide format support: JPEG, PNG, RAW from most cameras, HEIC, AVIF, SVG, PSD and common video formats.
• Web gallery and remote access: open your library in a browser at home or away, through PhotoNest’s built-in secure connection.
• Share links: share photos with anyone, with an optional password, expiry date and the option to hide location.
• Phone backup: back up photos from your phone straight to your PC.
• Photo info panel: camera, lens, exposure and file details, plus a mini map of where the photo was taken.
• Slideshow: in the desktop app, the web gallery and share links.
• Stacks: bursts and similar shots grouped under one cover photo, so the timeline stays tidy.
• Manual face tagging: draw a face frame yourself when automatic detection misses someone.
• Rotate photos.
• Themes: light, dark and true-black (OLED).
• Runs quietly in the background: keeps watching your folders from the system tray and can start with Windows.
• Automatic database backup: PhotoNest keeps a recent backup of its library database and can recover from it.
• Choose where data lives: put PhotoNest’s data folder (caches, models, database) on any drive.
• Location from many sources: EXIF, XMP sidecar files and GoPro videos.
• Web gallery extras: download originals and choose the video playback quality.

Requirements

• HEIC photos and HEVC videos need Microsoft’s HEIF Image Extensions and HEVC Video Extensions, or your own FFmpeg.

System requirements

OS

MinimumWindows 10 version 1909, 64-bit (x64)

RecommendedWindows 11

Processor

Minimum64-bit x64 processor

Recommended4+ cores

Memory

Minimum8 GB RAM

Recommended16 GB RAM for large libraries with AI features

Graphics

MinimumAny. Without a DirectX 12 GPU, PhotoNest uses software rendering (slower)

RecommendedDirectX 12 GPU

Graphics for AI

MinimumNot required: People and Smart Search also run on the processor (much slower)

RecommendedDirectX 12 GPU with 4 GB+ video memory

Disk

MinimumAbout 300 MB for the app + about 1 GB for AI models and map data (downloaded on first use) + thumbnail cache (1–32 GB, your choice)

RecommendedSSD