ExifTool is a long-standing Perl library and command-line tool for reading, writing, and erasing metadata across an exceptionally wide range of file formats, including JPEG, RAW camera formats, PDF, video, audio, and Office documents.
Official website exiftool.org
Our take
The format coverage here is unmatched: EXIF, IPTC, XMP, GPS, MakerNotes, ICC profiles, and dozens of camera manufacturer tags across hundreds of file types. Nothing else comes close for bulk metadata auditing or scrubbing a mixed archive of files. The catch is the interface: it is a Perl CLI tool with a large number of flags, and the learning curve is real. A Windows standalone .exe is available for non-Perl users. Anyone who needs to verify what metadata a file actually contains before sharing it should have ExifTool in their toolkit.
GitHub at a glance
exiftool/exiftool
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ExifTool alternatives
MAT2 MAT2 (Metadata Anonymisation Toolkit 2) removes embedded metadata from images, PDFs, audio files, office documents, and more. It runs as a CLI tool or as a file-manager extension for Nautilus and Dolphin on Linux.
ExifCleaner Removes metadata for the most popular image and video formats. It also supports PDF files and comes with batch-processing to process multiple files at once. Drag and Drop…
ExifEraser File support: JPEG, PNG and WebP.
Metapho Strips out metadata or remove location data only. Share without metadata just before sharing.
ExifTool license, in plain English
GPL-3.0 Strong copyleft
Free to use and modify, but anything you distribute that is built on it must also be open under the same license.
Permits
- Commercial use
- Modification
- Distribution
- Patent use
- Private use
Requires
- Disclose source
- Same license
- State changes
- License and copyright notice
Does not provide
- Liability cover
- Warranty
Why it matters: Strong copyleft keeps every distributed version open. A vendor cannot fold this into a closed product and ship it without releasing their changes.
Plain-language summary of the project's license, not legal advice. Read the full text for the exact terms.