QOI - The “Quite OK Image Format” for fast, lossless image compression

Single-file MIT licensed library for C/C++

See qoi.h for the documentation and format specification.

More info at https://qoiformat.org

Why?

Compared to stb_image and stb_image_write QOI offers 20x-50x faster encoding, 3x-4x faster decoding and 20% better compression. It's also stupidly simple and fits in about 300 lines of C.

Example Usage

• qoiconv.c converts between png <> qoi
• qoibench.c a simple wrapper to benchmark stbi, libpng and qoi

Limitations

The QOI file format allows for huge images with up to 18 exa-pixels. A streaming en-/decoder can handle these with minimal RAM requirements, assuming there is enough storage space.

This particular implementation of QOI however is limited to images with a maximum size of 400 million pixels. It will safely refuse to en-/decode anything larger than that. This is not a streaming en-/decoder. It loads the whole image file into RAM before doing any work and is not extensively optimized for performance (but it's still very fast).

If this is a limitation for your use case, please look into any of the other implementations listed below.

Improvements, New Versions and Contributing

The QOI format has been finalized. It was a conscious decision to not have a version number in the file header. If you have a working QOI implementation today, you can rest assured that it will be compatible with all QOI files tomorrow.

There are a lot of interesting ideas for a successor of QOI, but none of these will be implemented here. That doesn't mean you shouldn't experiment with QOI, but please be aware that pull requests that change the format will not be accepted.

Likewise, pull requests for performance improvements will probably not be accepted either, as this "reference implementation" tries to be as easy to read as possible.

Tools

• https://github.com/floooh/qoiview - native QOI viewer
• https://github.com/pfusik/qoi-ci/releases/tag/qoi-ci-1.1.1 - QOI Plugin installer for GIMP, Imagine, Paint.NET and XnView MP
• https://github.com/iOrange/QoiFileTypeNet/releases/tag/v0.2 - QOI Plugin for Paint.NET
• https://github.com/iOrange/QOIThumbnailProvider - Add thumbnails for QOI images in Windows Explorer
• https://github.com/Tom94/tev - another native QOI viewer (allows pixel peeping and comparison with other image formats)
• https://apps.apple.com/br/app/qoiconverterx/id1602159820 QOI <=> PNG converter available on the Mac App Store
• https://github.com/kaetemi/qoi-max - QOI Bitmap I/O Plugin for 3ds Max
• https://raylibtech.itch.io/rtexviewer - texture viewer, supports QOI
• https://raylibtech.itch.io/rtexpacker - texture packer, supports QOI
• https://github.com/DmitriySalnikov/godot_qoi - QOI GDNative Addon for Godot Engine
• https://gitlab.com/dan9er/farbfeld-convert-qoi - QOI <=> farbfeld converter

Implementations & Bindings of QOI

• https://github.com/pfusik/qoi-ci (Ć, transpiled to C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Python and Swift)
• https://github.com/kodonnell/qoi (Python)
• https://github.com/JaffaKetchup/dqoi (Dart, with Flutter support)
• https://github.com/Cr4xy/lua-qoi (Lua)
• https://github.com/superzazu/SDL_QOI (C, SDL2 bindings)
• https://github.com/saharNooby/qoi-java (Java)
• https://github.com/MasterQ32/zig-qoi (Zig)
• https://github.com/rbino/qoix (Elixir)
• https://github.com/NUlliiON/QoiSharp (C#)
• https://github.com/aldanor/qoi-rust (Rust)
• https://github.com/zakarumych/rapid-qoi (Rust)
• https://github.com/takeyourhatoff/qoi (Go)
• https://github.com/DosWorld/pasqoi (Pascal)
• https://github.com/elihwyma/Swift-QOI (Swift)
• https://github.com/xfmoulet/qoi (Go)
• https://erratique.ch/software/qoic (OCaml)
• https://github.com/arian/go-qoi (Go)
• https://github.com/kchapelier/qoijs (JavaScript)
• https://github.com/KristofferC/QOI.jl (Julia)
• https://github.com/shadowMitia/libqoi/ (C++)
• https://github.com/MKCG/php-qoi (PHP)
• https://github.com/LightHouseSoftware/qoiformats (D)
• https://github.com/mhoward540/qoi-nim (Nim)
• https://github.com/wx257osn2/qoixx (C++)
• https://github.com/Tiefseetauchner/lr-paint (Processing)
• https://github.com/amstan/qoi-fpga (FPGA: verilog)
• https://github.com/musabkilic/qoi-decoder (Python)
• https://github.com/mathpn/py-qoi (Python)
• https://github.com/JohannesFriedrich/qoi4R (R)
• https://github.com/shraiwi/mini-qoi (C, streaming decoder)

QOI Support in Other Software

• SerenityOS supports decoding QOI system wide through a custom cpp implementation in LibGfx
• Raylib supports decoding and encoding QOI textures through its rtextures module
• Rebol3 supports decoding and encoding QOI using a native codec
• c-ray supports QOI natively
• SAIL image decoding library, supports decoding and encoding QOI images
• Orx 2D game engine, supports QOI natively
• IrfanView supports decoding and encoding QOI through its Formats plugin
• ImageMagick supports decoding and encoding QOI, since 7.1.0-20
• barebox bootloader, supports decoding QOI images for splash logo, since v2022.03.0
• KorGE & KorIM Kotlin 2D game engine and imaging library, supports decoding and encoding QOI natively since 2.7.0
• DOjS DOS JavaScript Canvas implementation supports loading QOI files

Packages

AUR - system-wide qoi.h, qoiconv and qoibench install as split packages.

Implementations not yet conforming to the final specification

These implementations are based on the pre-release version of QOI. Resulting files are not compatible with the current version.

• https://github.com/ChevyRay/qoi_rs (Rust)
• https://github.com/panzi/jsqoi (TypeScript)
• https://github.com/0xd34df00d/hsqoi (Haskell)