CRW Converter
FileFlip converts CRW files into 62 other formats entirely inside your browser, using ImageMagick, MuPDF and Pandoc compiled to WebAssembly. The CRW file is never uploaded to a server: it is read off your disk, converted on your own machine, and saved back by the browser. There is no file-size limit and no account to create.
How do I convert a CRW file?#
- Drop your CRW file onto the converter at the top of this page, or click it to pick one from your computer.
- Choose the format you want out of it. FileFlip downloads the engine that conversion needs, once, and your browser caches it.
- Conversion starts the moment you pick the format, and the result is yours to download. The work happens in this tab, so nothing is uploaded and nothing is queued.
Is it safe to convert CRW files online?#
Yes, because nothing is uploaded. FileFlip converts CRW files inside the browser tab you already have open, using WebAssembly builds of the same engines a desktop converter would install. Your file is read from your own disk into the page's memory, and no request carrying it is ever made.
You do not have to take that on trust. Open your browser's network panel, run a conversion, and you will see the engine come down and your file go nowhere. There is no upload, no server-side copy, no retention window, and no account tied to what you converted.
How FileFlip works lists every engine, its version and its download size, and shows how to check for yourself that nothing leaves your machine.
What happens to a CRW file#
FileFlip converts CRW into 62 formats with ImageMagick, MuPDF and Pandoc, all of it inside the browser tab. Each conversion below names the engine it uses, what it downloads, and exactly what that conversion keeps or drops.
| Category | Image Files |
|---|---|
| File extension | .crw |
| FileFlip support | Read only, so it is a source rather than a target |
| Conversions available | 62 |
| Engines | ImageMagick, MuPDF and Pandoc |
| Downloaded to your browser | 14.1 MB on the first conversion, then cached |
What is a CRW file?#
A CRW file holds raw sensor data in Camera Image File Format, the CIFF container Canon specified in February 1997 and used for its early PowerShot compacts and its first digital EOS bodies until the TIFF-based CR2 format replaced it in 2004.
Nobody chooses CRW today; it turns up when opening an archive shot on an EOS D30, D60, 10D or 300D, or on a PowerShot G-series or S-series compact from the same years.
Convert CRW to DNG when archiving old photos so they stay readable by software that no longer bothers with CIFF, or to JPEG when the picture just needs to be shared.
The CRW file format reference covers the specification, the programs that open one, and what each conversion keeps or drops.
CRW questions people ask#
What camera made a CRW file?
CRW came from Canon's first digital SLRs and several early PowerShot compacts, specifically the EOS D30, D60, 10D and 300D, the PowerShot G1 through G6, the PowerShot S30 through S70, and the PowerShot Pro1. Canon switched to CR2 in 2004, so a CRW file is at least two decades old, and its EXIF data names the exact body.
What software still opens CRW files?
Adobe Photoshop, Camera Raw and Lightroom Classic still decode CRW, as do the open-source raw tools built on LibRaw and dcraw, including darktable, RawTherapee and digiKam. Canon shipped Digital Photo Professional and ZoomBrowser EX with the cameras that wrote CRW, though the current versions of Canon's software are aimed at newer bodies.
What is the difference between CRW and CR2?
CRW uses Canon's CIFF container, which identifies itself with the marker HEAPCCDR in the first bytes of the file and is unrelated to any other image format, while CR2 is built on TIFF and stores the sensor data as lossless JPEG. Canon changed over in 2004, and the two need separate decoders even though both hold Canon raw data.
Should I convert CRW files to DNG?
Converting CRW to DNG is worth doing for long-term storage, because DNG has a published specification while CIFF support depends on decoders that were reverse-engineered years ago. The conversion carries the sensor data across without re-rendering it, so image quality is unchanged, and some Canon-specific metadata is what gets dropped. Adobe only published DNG in 2004, by which point Canon was already moving from CRW to CR2, so shooting DNG was never an option on these cameras.