Whether you're an amateur, enthusiast or professional photographer, you need photo organizing software to help you stay on top of your image library. Even a simple afternoon photography session, whether it's in a studio or out and about, will produce hundreds of images, so after a few of those, finding that specific image you want could take a lot of time if you don't organize your images.

A good piece of photo organizing software will let you categorize images by location, date, and even individual people in each image, with some offering smart tools for tagging similar images or those taken in the same place or at the same time.

We spent more than 160 hours testing 10 photo organizing programs, paying particular attention to customizable organizing features, ease of use and editing abilities. We wanted to know which programs were the best at categorizing and helping you sift through images.

The Best Mobile Apps for Watching Video The Best Baseball Apps to Follow the MLB 2018 Season 9 Best Food Tracking Apps Get Healthy With the 9 Best Fitness Tracker. Best photo organizing software for Mac, as of 2018 Gemini 2: The duplicate photo finder. The first thing you need to do to organize photos is remove the extras. There’s a high chance you’ve got plenty of duplicates and similar images — 15 shots from slightly different angles, for instance.

Since sharing is important, we also looked for software that allows you to create and share slideshows, albums and edited photos directly to social media.

Our best pick for photo organizing software, based on our testing, is ACDSee 20 Pro due to its exceptional organizing features and sharing capabilities. You can choose between several different sorting methods, which helps you find one that fits your style best. While the categorizing side of the software is simple and easy to use, the editing side is more complicated, but it will allow you to enhance your photos using both basic and advanced tools.

App For Organize Image Mac 2018 Holiday

Best Overall

ACDSee Photo Studio Professional 2019

ACDSee 20 lets you easily view and edit your photos' metadata, and it also lets you organize your photos by keyword, calendar date, category, location, color labels and number ratings.

Best Value

Smart Pix Manager

Smart Pix Manager offers a wide selection of organizing options, as well as convenient tools such as the ability to check and remove duplicate files, all while still being one of the least expensive programs.

Best for Basic Video Edits

CyberLink PhotoDirector 10 Ultra

The organizational tools are easy to use and offer a variety of options, but the best thing about this program is its ability to create and edit photos made from your videos.

1. ACDSee Photo Studio Professional 2019: Best overall

ACDSee Photo Studio Professional 2019

Easy to use and powerful, ACDSee is our top choice overall

SPECIFICATIONS

Compatible with: Windows | Hard disk space: 2GB | RAM needed: 2GB | Min resolution: 1024x768

Reasons to Buy

You can search for and delete duplicate files

Reasons to Avoid

Not Mac compatible

Photo Studio Professional Monthly

$8.90

Photo Studio Professional Annual

$89

Photo Studio Professional Lifetime

ACDSee Photo Studio Professional 2019 allows you to organize your photos in a variety of ways, such as using keyword tags or color labels.

You can also give your photos number ratings so you can easily sift through your best images. The organizational interface is intuitive and easy to navigate. The program allows you to regulate your photo collection by viewing and editing metadata, and it can search for and delete duplicate images.
It supports 86 different file formats, making it highly likely that your specific projects are supported and compatible. The most common files – RAW, JPG, TIFF and PSD – are on the list. You can also directly import images from cameras, scanners and flash drives.
The 54 included filters, making it easy to give your photos an artistic feel. You can also perform basic edits, including red-eye removal, cropping, resizing and color adjustments. This program does a really good job of keeping your photo's image quality high after making an edit. The batch processing feature saves time by making the same edits to multiple images at once.
You can create slideshows using your favorite photos and share your photo and video projects to Facebook and Flickr. While ACDSee Systems does offer an online photo gallery, you must pay to use it. There are a few basic printing templates to help you create the projects you want.

Read the review: ACDSee Photo Studio Professional 2019

2. Smart Pix Manager: Best value

Smart Pix Manager

Versatile with features like slide shows, Smart Pix Manager offers good value for money

SPECIFICATIONS

Compatible with: Windows | Download file size: 3.9MB

Reasons to Buy

You can organize photos in a variety of ways

Reasons to Avoid

Cannot post directly to Facebook or Flickr

While this program isn't the easiest to use, it does offer all the organizational features you could want at a lower price.

In addition to helping you arrange your photos, this program also organizes videos and music. If you need help using the program, the wizard can walk you through various functions.
This software allows you to directly import images from flash drives, cameras and scanners. The program isn't compatible with as many file types as some other photo organizing software, but it does support 22 different file types. Compatible image files include RAW, JPEG, PSD, PNG and TIFF.
A few basic editing tools are available with this program. This includes the ability to resize, crop and rotate photos as well as the ability to remove red eye, sharpen and make color enhancements. Its batch-processing capabilities can save time by making the same edits to multiple photos at once.
When you are done perfecting your images, this program can help you create slideshows with your images. It won’t let you post directly to any social media sites, but you can email them to family and friends. Smart Pix Manager has one of the widest selections of printable templates, including larger-than-life 10-foot prints.

Read the review: Smart Pix Manager 12

3. CyberLink PhotoDirector 10 Ultra: Best for basic video edits

App For Organize Image Mac 2018 Collections

CyberLink PhotoDirector 10 Ultra

With a face-recognition tool and great editing features, this is a good video editor too

SPECIFICATIONS

Compatible with: Windows, MacOS | Hard disk space: 2GB | RAM needed: 4GB | Min resolution: 1024x768

Reasons to Buy

Face-recognition tool can help you sort images by person

Photos maintain good image quality after the program makes edits

Reasons to Avoid

Limited file compatibility

Can only check for duplicate files when importing new photos

PhotoDirector 365 Monthly

$14.99

PhotoDirector 365 Yearly

$43.99

PhotoDirector 10 Ultra

This program isn't the most intuitive to use, but it isn't overly complicated either. You can organize your photos by keywords, color labels, star ratings and categories; however, you cannot organize them by calendar date.

The metadata is fully viewable and editable so you can remember what setting your camera used to capture your favorite photos. You can choose how frequently the backup manager reminds you to save your photos, which offers up some peace of mind.
This program has a wide range of basic and advanced editing tools and allow you to work in layers. One of the nicest features allows you to import video files and turn selected stills into photos. This feature combined with the face swap tool can also help you get the perfect photo by exchange a blinking or frowning video still for an open-eyed or smiling expression. There are 42 effects filters and other auto editing capabilities to help you quickly enhance your photos.
You can pull images directly from flash drives, cameras and scanners