Download NPS Image Editor for Legacy Systems 1.3.0 build 700 beta

NPS Image Editor is a free, unique image editing program that is perfect for pixel art, drawing, and photo editing. It is lightweight, customizable, and intuitive, yet surprisingly powerful. This version is designed for older systems running Windows 98, XP, Vista, and 7 and requires .NET Framework 2.0; read more on the website.

Added indexed color support and Filter Gallery (NPS 4.2.8 feature cut)

Release date: February 1, 2025

Select a file to download

npslegacy_1.3.0_702.exe
Full installer, recommended for most users. May require admin rights.
npslegacy_1.3.0_702.zip
Standalone zip archive that does not require installation or admin rights

Release notes for this version

  • New layer features
    • Added support for opening animated GIF and multi-page TIF
    • Added frame mode so each layer can display individually
    • Added new color modes: High Color, Web Safe, Palette, Indexed, Bitmap (monochrome)
    • Added Transparency Mode for controlling layer transparency, use transparent background color when transparency is disabled
    • Added PgUp/PgDn keyboard shortcuts to move between layers. Hold Shift to toggle visibility (e.g. stepping through an animated GIF). Shift+Space toggles visibility without moving to the next layer.
    • Added warning when loading truecolor GIF, just in case it's mis-detected and was intended to be an animated GIF
    • Added Show All/Hide All to layer list
    • Spritesheet support
  • Indexed color support
    • Added support for editing indexed images including BMP, GIF, and PNG
    • Global color mode, allowing you to share a palette across all layers
    • Palette generation using Median Cut, Uniform, Most Common, and First X algorithms
    • Quantization to predefined palette including custom palettes
    • Powerful palette editor with the ability to sort, deduplicate, export, and replace colors; also supports re-indexing an existing indexed image
    • Palette filters for indexed images, e.g. you can use channel mixers to adjust palette colors without modifying image pixels in Indexed mode
    • Limited support for semi-transparent palette entries in PNGs
    • Support indexed mode in most tools (though some tools are restricted, e.g. Airbrush Smooth mode will be disabled)
    • Add "reduce color depth" to Color menu, quantizes the image without changing format
  • New drawing features
    • Added Filter Gallery
    • Added support for palette filters
  • Bug fixes and general improvements
    • Renamed "Black and White" filter to "Threshold" to match NPS 4.x
    • Fixed About box shadows around credits on Windows 98
    • Added scaling support for Windows 7 and higher
    • Disabled per-monitor scaling option (did nothing)
    • Fixed skin preview in Configuration Panel
    • Fixed MsgBoxEx icons on Windows 98
    • Fixed weird EULA form sizing
    • Speed up color picker loading on 2nd time
    • Add progress indicator to multi-frame file load
    • Fixed NPSD loading layers in wrong order when more than 10 layers
    • Fixed layers moving to 0,0 during Canvas Size operation
    • Fixed unrecoverable crash when trying to flatten a single layer
    • Fixed missing title for Document Recovery
    • Jump to active layer after opening file
    • Fixed layer control getting stuck in drag mode
    • Updated indexed and multilayer warnings for GIF and TIF (since we support both indexed and multilayer now)
    • Fix crash when creating negative stride image from clipboard
    • Fixed text tool preview cut off
    • Renamed "Add Palette Entry" to "Edit Palette Entry" when editing
    • Added Validate feature to debug mode to check if all needed libraries actually can load, useful for verifying it works on e.g. corporate computers with blocked DLLs
    • Fixed crash when saving swatch palette after editing properties
    • Fixed palette description sometimes showing up as the text "0"
    • Hide "Show border" checkbox in swatch palette properties
    • Updated tip of the day
  • You can now create your own document templates or launch a template from any location with a .npst file
  • Appearance and theming
    • Reverted from "Metro" design to classic design. You can still re-enable Metro if you like it.
  • Color picker and palettes
    • Added indexed color support and better palette support
    • Added Swatches from Image command to generate a swatch palette from your current image
    • Added transparent color to Default palette
    • Control drag-to-reorder in swatch palette via Edit menu (to avoid accidental editing)
    • Added quantization support to classic palette
    • Updated swatch palettes with erroneous colors: Basic Colors, NPS Legacy, VGA
    • Added new swatch palettes: Iron, Wide, XP Icon
    • Added setting for resident color picker for faster loads
  • Updated NPSD format to version 1.4
    • Support for indexed image editing
    • Support for more color modes and transparency modes
    • Support for animation
  • Limitations
    • GIF cannot load per-frame palettes. Each frame will contain the full animation in truecolor mode. Saving will re-index those frames with a default quantizer unless you do it manually.
    • GIF cannot save true-color
    • TIFF can load multiple pages but cannot save them.
    • No ICO support like 4.2.8