How to Play HEIC Photos from iPhone on Plex Media Server [Ultimate Guide]
Last Updated on February 28, 2023 by Peter Wood
Can you play HEIC photos on Plex when you sync the iPhone photos to the media server? Once you have uploaded the HEIC files to Plex, you might not find the photos because of compatibility issues. Is there a plugin on Plex Media Server to browse the photos from iPhone directly? Just learn more about the ultimate guide from the article.
Part 1: Does Plex Support HEIC Photos from iPhone
Plex provides some basic features, such as support for multiple photo libraries and playlist building for custom slideshows. It can display JPG, PNG, RAW, and TBN image files. Plex includes built-in tools that convert non-natively supported files, such as DTS to a usable format. But you cannot play HEIC files directly in Plex, or the synced HEIC files are not visible.
Is there a Plex Media Server plug-in for HEIC photos? No. There are different plugins for Plex. But it is difficult to install the photo codec to the media server. Different from Google Photos that convert HEIC to JPEG automatically, you have to convert the HEICs to JPEG, PNG, or other compatible formats manually. Of course, you can also choose JPEG, or the most compatible format when you take photos with your iPhone.
Part 2: How to Convert HEIC for Plex Media Server
What is the best method to convert HEIC for Plex? Whether you need to convert a large amount of iPhone photos or customize the photos for the photo library, WidsMob HEIC is one of the best HEIC toolkits to view, convert and manage the HEIC files. The program converts HEIC/HEIF files from iPhone to JPEG/PNG/GIF, rotates the photos, resizes the files, and adds text watermarks.
- Convert HEIC to JPEG, PNG, and BMP that are compatible with Plex.
- Provide editing features to rotate, resize, and rename HEICs in batch.
- Support HEIC files, Live Photos, sequence photos, burst images, etc.
- Enable to convert multiple-layer HEICs to a series of photos easily.
Step 1: Go to the Plex Media Server on your computer and navigate to the HEIC files. Right-click the HEIC files and click the Download button in the context menu. Of course, you can also remove them from Plex and transfer the HEIC from iPhone to iMac.
Step 2: Once you have installed WidsMob HEIC, you can launch the program on your computer. After that, you can drag-n-drop the HEICs, you can preview the photos in both thumbnail and full-screen. Just select the desired HEIC photos you want to convert for Plex.
Step 3: To customize the HEIC file in both height and width, you can choose the Free mode from the mode option. Enter both width and height in pixels for the images, and then you can also enter the desired resolution in pixels/inch before converting HEIC for Plex.
Step 4: When you need to convert single-layer HEIC files to another format, you can select the desired photos you want to convert. Moreover, you can also go to the full-screen mode and click the Export button to convert HEIC to JPEG, BMP, TIFF, and GIF for Plex.
Part 3: FAQs about HEIC Plex
Log in to the web dashboard of your Plex Media Server and click on the + symbol next to the Libraries entry. Name the photo library and select the HEIC photo folder you want to create. In the Advanced option, you can check the Add Library option to create a photo library for HEIC in Plex.
Because the HEIC/HEIF is not a compatible format of Plex Media Server, it is the reason that you cannot view the files. But the photos are still available on the media server, you have to download them to your computer and convert HEIC to PNG formats instead.
Go to your iPhone and tap the Camera app. Choose the Formats option and change your iPhone camera format to Most Compatible from the default. After that, you can save the JPEG instead of HEIC on iPhone before auto-syncing to Plex.