darktable
Open source non-destructive RAW editor and virtual darkroom with zoomable lighttable, database-driven organization, HDR and EXR support, floating-point workflow, batch exporting, and advanced editing for photography and scientific imaging across platforms.
Cost / License
- Free
- Open Source
Application types
EUPlatforms
- Mac
- Windows
- Linux
Features
Properties
- Privacy focused
Features
- RAW Photo Editors
- Advanced retouching
- No Coding Required
- Non Destructive Editing
- No registration required
- Watermark images
- Multiple languages
- Built-in viewer
- Dark Mode
- Ad-free
- Works Offline
- Hardware Accelerated
- Photographic filters
- Geotagged Photos
- Batch Editing
- No Tracking
- Live Preview
- Support for scripting
- Extensible by Plugins/Extensions
- Lua scripting
- File Tagging
- Portable
- Command line interface
Tags
- Photo Editing
- cl-support
- image-rating
- photography
- RAW
- raw-image-editing
darktable News & Activities
Recent News
- POX published news article about darktable
darktable 5.2 released with side-by-side snapshot viewing, multi-preset export, and moredarktable 5.2.0 delivers a substantial update for photographers and editors using this open source ...
- POX published news article about darktable
Darktable 5.0 enhances photo editing with improved UI/UX and performance boostsDarktable has released version 5.0 of its free and open source photo editing software, introducing ...
- Maoholguin published news article about darktable
Darktable 4.8: new color equalizer, canvas tools, and enhanced camera support releaseddarktable 4.8, the latest update of the open-source RAW image editor, has been released with signif...
Recent activities
yellowdolphin added darktable as alternative to RetroShine- Agibi liked darktable
- thinks Privacy focused is a important feature of darktable
vasilis_evag added darktable as alternative to Photonest Plus
Featured in Lists
## THIS LIST HAS BEEN DELETED DUE TO A BUG, SO IT MISSES SOME HONORABLE MENTIONS ! This is the apps for Windows 10 …
This is going to be a list of the free tools/software that can be used mostly in any field. it's based on websites …
There is no doubt that Adobe Suite is great, even in some case it's probably the best. But you can be mad …
What is darktable?
darktable is a virtual lighttable and darkroom for photographers: it manages your digital negatives in a database and lets you view them through a zoomable lighttable. it also enables you to develop raw images and enhance them.
This project tries to fill the gap between the many excellent existing free raw converters and image management tools (such as 
UFRaw or 
F-Spot). The user interface is built around efficient caching of image metadata and mipmaps, all stored in a database. The user will always be able to interact, even if the full resolution image is not yet loaded.
All editing is fully non-destructive and only operates on cached image buffers for display. The full image is only converted during export. the frontend is written in gtk+/cairo, the database uses sqlite3, raw image loading is done using libraw, hdr, exr and low dynamic range are supported through imagemagick (magickcore). the core operates completely on floating point values, so darktable can not only be used for photography but also for scientifically acquired images or output of renderers (high dynamic range).
darktable information
Developed by
darktable.org Licensing
Open Source (GPL-3.0) and Free product.Written in
Rating
Average rating of 4.4Alternatives
69 alternatives listedNews
5 news article related to darktableSupported Languages
- English
AlternativeTo Categories
Photos & Graphics, System & Hardware, File Management, OS & UtilitiesGitHub repository
- 11,734 Stars
- 1,255 Forks
- 499 Open Issues
- Updated
Comments and Reviews
Darktable's 16-bit-per-color, non-destructive photo editing allowed me to finally get rid of Adobe Photoshop so that I could switch to Linux. I still use GIMP for filters and drawing/touch-up, but do all my initial editing and color correction of RAW files in Darktable. Photoshop is more convenient because it does filters and touch-up in the same application, but Darktable works on Linux and is good enough (with GIMP), so bye-bye Adobe (and Windows)!
Good for developing raw photos, doing non-destructive editing, and managing large galleries.
The most capable RAW editor, as a professional photographer. Only 4 stars, because the UI/UX needs a redesign IMO and the GUI is often overwhelming to a degree of confusion. The built in explanations came really handy (hover the mouse over), but the explanations of said function sometimes too technical, even for me - and I did previously worked as a developer -, especially for the target audience of photographers. The tagging and metadata editor needs a redesign as well, but after the user get used to the clanky UI/UX, it is the most powerful RAW editor.
Downloaded it a while ago and was shocked at it's capability. I work with images sometimes, and this will always be in my workflow. It can do everything Lightroom does and more.
Literally the best open source alternative to lightroom. Great processing quality, tons of options, and modern, easy to use interface.
Windows 7 does not work on
More powerfull than Lightroom. FOSS.