ComicView: Image Archive Viewer

ComicView is an image archive viewer for ZIP, RAR, CBR and CBZ files. Open archive files containing images and browse them in a fullscreen mode with a keyboard- and mouse-friendly user interface.

This image archive viewer is built in Python and uses Qt for its user interface.

It can be used for viewing comic books, photo collections, or any image archives.

Features

• View images from ZIP, RAR, CBR and CBZ archives (PNG, JPG)
• Fullscreen view
• Mouse and keyboard navigation
• Zoom and pan with mouse or keyboard

The list of files in the archive is sorted alphabetically upon loading.

To see help in the application press "H" at any time.

Supported Formats

Archive Formats

• CBR files (.cbr) - Comic Book RAR files
• CBZ files (.cbz) - Comic Book ZIP files
• RAR files (.rar) - RAR archives
• ZIP files (.zip) - ZIP archives

Image Formats

• PNG (.png)
• JPEG (.jpg, .jpeg)

Installation

Compatibility

ComicView works with:

• Linux
• macOS
• Microsoft Windows

Prerequisites

• Python 3.8 or higher
• unrar (for reading CBR and RAR files)

Dependencies

• PyQt5
• Pillow
• rarfile (for reading CBR and RAR files)

The application will fail reading CBR and RAR files if unrar is not installed.

• for macOS and Linux: unrar can be installed using a package manager (e.g. Homebrew on macOS)
• for Windows: download unrar from the RARLab site and put it in a folder on the system search PATH.

Install from PyPI

You can install ComicView as a uv tool and then run it directly from shell:

uv tool install image-archive-viewer

The application installed this way will be available globally on the command line. This installation method requires the uv package manager for Python.

You can also install ComicView using pip or uv pip command, typically inside a Python virtual environment:

pip install image-archive-viewer

Using uv pip:

uv pip install image-archive-viewer

Usage

After installation, run the viewer:

comic_view

You will be prompted to select a comic book or archive file containing images. The viewer will open in a fullscreen mode.

Controls

Navigation

• Right Arrow or Space: Next image
• Left Arrow: Previous image
• Q or Esc: Quit

Zoom

• + or =: Zoom in
• -: Zoom out
• 0: Reset zoom to fit window
• Mouse wheel: Zoom in/out (centered on cursor)

Panning

• W: Pan down
• S: Pan up
• A: Pan right
• D: Pan left
• Mouse drag: Pan image (when zoomed in)

Other

• H: Show/hide help information
• O: Open a new archive file

Tips

• Press H anytime to see a help screen with all available controls
• Use 0 to quickly reset zoom and fit the image to the window
• The mouse wheel zooms centered on your cursor position for precise control
• When zoomed in, you can drag with the mouse to pan around the image

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.