Download Paint.NET 4.2

Version 4.2 of Paint.NET has been released. This drawing and image editing program bridges the gap between the Paint supplied with Windows and expensive but very extensive programs such as Adobe Photoshop and Corel Photo Paint. Today, the program is also offered via the Windows Store offered, although a small fee is charged for that version. The release notes for this release can be found below.

paint.net 4.2 is now available!

This is a big update that focus on adding HEIC file format support, fixing performance with very large images, and upgrading and modernizing the functionality of many existing file types (JPEG, PNG, BMP, GIF, and TIFF). Many other quality of life issues have also been addressed or fixed.

If you’re using the Windows Store release, you should get the update automatically within the next 24 hours. You can also force an update check by following these instructions.

For the Classic release, you should be offered the update automatically within the next week or so. You can get the updater soon by going to ⚙ Settings → Updates → Check Now. You can also download and install it directly from the website.

It’s important to note that HEIC file format support requires two things: 1) you must be using Windows 10 v1809 or newer, and 2) you must install Microsoft’s HEVC Video Extensions from the Microsoft Store which costs $1. This is necessary due to HEVC being mired in licensing and patent royalty costs. If you want to find some HEIC images, look no further than your recent iPhone (7 or newer). Many newer Android devices also support it.

Most of the other built-in file types — BMP, GIF, PNG, JPEG, and TIFF — have been internally upgraded from using GDI+ to being built on top of WIC (Windows Imaging Component). BMP can now save 32-bit images with alpha transparency, while JPEG and PNG can now load and save much larger images, and TIFF now supports saving at 24-bit and 8-bit color depths (“Auto” is also now included).

On the performance side, I’ve rebuilt the data structures inside of the rendering engine that are used for keeping track of invalidation regions. These hold information about what parts of the image need to be rendered and then redrawn on the screen, either because the image has been changed (like with drawings or effects) or because of scrolling and zooming. In previous versions you couldn’t really work with very large images, starting around 32,000 x 32,000 pixels. Zooming in and out would result in a lot of slow performance, lag, and even complete hangs of the app for seconds — or more (at 60,000 pixels it could hang for 30-60 seconds or more!). Now this should all be completely fluid

Please note that a previous beta, 4.2 build 7121, included functionality that would automatically apply an image’s embedded color profile, thus converting the image to the sRGB color space and “fixing” its colors. The complexity of color management was much higher than expected, and thus it has been removed for now. It may come back in a future update but in a more substantial form. Check out Jeffrey Friedl’s excellent Digital-Image Color Spaces article for a good read on this subject.