What is a RAW file?
A .RAW file contains unprocessed data directly from a sensor, software, or hardware device. The .RAW extension is highly overloaded and shared by many different industries. It can be an X-ray diffraction file from Bruker or Rigaku, a material testing file from Instron Bluehill, or a mass spectrometry file from Thermo Scientific.
Beyond scientific instruments, the .RAW extension is frequently used for uncompressed digital camera images, unprocessed audio data, Flipper Zero RFID captures, circuit simulation output from LTspice, and raw disk images for systems like Fedora Linux or the Dolphin Emulator.
How to open RAW files?
Because .RAW has multiple possible meanings, it is difficult to know which program you need. viewer.online/raw analyzes .RAW files to identify their exact format and creator software, shows which programs can open the file, and usually previews it.
Best practices and troubleshooting
Always check the source of the file. If you know the .RAW file is an image, tools like Adobe Photoshop or GIMP can open it. If it is scientific data, you must use the proprietary instrument software provided by the manufacturer. For raw audio streams, you can use Audacity to import raw data, provided you know the correct sample rate.
If you want to share a camera .RAW image with others, we recommend file conversion to sensible target formats on convert.guru. You can easily convert camera raw files to .JPG or .PNG for better compatibility.
Summary
viewer.online/raw directly opens and previews .RAW files in the browser, eliminating the need to install software or troubleshoot compatibility issues.