After install the Media Preview Configuration window will popup to allow selecting which formats to include. The number of video types it supports is an impressive 46 and includes the 3G Partnership Project, Audio Video Interleaved, Flash Video, Matroska Video, MPEG, Windows Media, RAD Game Tools, Quicktime, RealMedia, Video Object and Ogg Video.ĭuring install, you can opt out of the image and audio shell extensions if they are not required.

Although there’s been no updates since 2014 it still helps fill in the gaps left by Windows. Media Preview not just helps you display thumbnails for several video formats but also for a number of image and audio formats as well.

Here we show you some dedicated tools and video codec packs that can add thumbnail preview images for dozens of extra video types. For that, you will need an extra piece of software. If you would like Windows to recognize all the extra video formats that don’t show a thumbnail preview image, the operating system has to be helped to identify what the format is. If the format is not supported your thumbnail will be a standard icon for that file type or a blank icon. Windows 10 can show Matroska (MKV) thumbnails as standard and has better MP4 support although there are still several video formats that no version of Windows supports out of the box. Support for displaying video thumbnails has increased with each new Windows release as new video formats become integrated by default.

A video thumbnail will be a still frame taken at random from near the start of the video. When certain images and video files are viewed as icons, instead of a generic file type icon you will see a thumbnail preview image from the content of the file. They can effectively be viewed as lists, detailed lists, tiles or different size icons. Anybody that uses Windows File Explorer will know there’s a few different modes to display files.

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