One of the biggest frustrating parts of moving from Windows to Mac started with the image preview tool. Such a simple function user experience that Windows Image Previewer is doing since XP, but Apple resists to adopt it. Once you open any image in the folder, you should be able to scroll through the next and previous images using arrow keys.

• Faststone Image Viewer For Mac
• Faststone Image Viewer For Mac Os X Download
• Faststone Viewer For Mac Os X

So default image preview app in Mac OS X (Seira or any previous version) SUCKS BIG TIME!

It works only if you select all images, right-click and hit preview, and then use up and down keys. That’s like 3 clicks painfully long process to what you can easily do with a single click. So I was on a hunt to find an app that can build Windows like image browsing with simple arrow keys, and simple zooming features with maybe some additional features.

FastStone Image Viewer is not available for Mac but there are plenty of alternatives that runs on macOS with similar functionality. The most popular Mac alternative is XnView MP.It's not free, so if you're looking for a free alternative, you could try Photoscape or Adobe Bridge.If that doesn't suit you, our users have ranked more than 50 alternatives to FastStone Image Viewer and many of them. XnViewMP is the closest solution to FastStone on OsX. It's a very powerful software, and you can customize the standard interface to have something more similar to FastStone (add buttons, close some panels). And it's free for personal use. Another solution is ACDSee Mac Pro 3, a more developed (but expensive) alternative.

Also Read:Fotojet Designer Mac App Review – For Designing Social Posts/Printables

Windows Like Best Photo Preview App for Mac OS X

The app I am going to suggest if called PhotoX, and its a completely free app on Mac App Store, but few steps mentioned below will make it run as good as windows preview tool and scrolling through images will be awesome again!

Download & Install the App

Faststone Image Viewer For Mac

Head over to the Mac OS app store, and download our Windows like image browsing tool PhotoX.

Faststone Image Viewer For Mac Os X Download

Make it Default Image Preview App

Once you install the app, you have to make it a default preview app, otherwise, you have to right-click and select open with to work it properly.

Go to any of your folder with photos.

Faststone Viewer For Mac Os X

Right-click (control-click) on any image.

Click on Get Info > Click on Open With > Select Photo X > Click on Change All.

This will give you a warning that you are changing the default app for that image format. Just confirm and you’re done.

Finishing Touch!

You’re not quite done yet. As the first image, you select, might be just a JPEG. And your new Windows-like photo viewer PhotoX only defaults for that format.

So just enlist the most formats you need. My requirement was just JPEGs and PNGs. So I opened another GET INFO tab, and set PhotoX as default previewer there.

You can do additional image formats, for which you need quick formatting.

So PhotoX, not only allows you to scroll images with side arrows just like in Windows, but you can zoom in and out with Up & Down Arrows, Rotate, Tilt, Flip image, all of the good stuff using this single app!

I simply loved a lot of things on Mac OS X, but this photo scrolling using arrow keys was the first thing I wanted to fix immediately. There are other free apps like Xee, or paid ones with even better options for editing like Adobe Lightroom, but for most basic functionality I thought it’s ridiculous to pay for an app, that does nothing but scrolling through images. So PhotoX is the best Image preview app for me at least.

Please share what other problems you might have faced with image previews, or if any other app you would like to recommend, in the comments section below.