Digital cameras owners know that resizing huge snapshots inevitably reduces the image quality, but simply rotating a JPEG file 90 degrees can compromise an image's quality and strip it of important file information, such as time and date. Nico Cuppen's Lossless JPEG Rotator can reorient digital images without loss of image quality or data so that they stay properly oriented whether they're viewed in applications that can read image-orienting data or not. It can reorient single pictures or whole folders of images automatically.

The program's interface is nothing more than a small dialog that's pretty much a Help button and settings for original file backups, a subfolders option, and EXIF timestamps. All the action takes place on the image file itself or by right-clicking the host folder's menu to access the program's Auto rotate, Rotate left, and Rotate right commands. It's the Auto rotate function that sets Lossless JPEG Rotator apart from similar tools. It automatically orients images that use a digital camera's gravity sensor data, something that many applications and most DVD players can't do.

Lossless JPEG Rotator is freeware that's listed as working in all versions of Windows from 95 to 7. It installs desktop icons without asking and leaves stuff behind when it's uninstalled, but it's otherwise a well-mannered and competent utility that can help digital camera owners or any PC user save time when handling saved images. We especially like its ability to automatically rotate a folder full of huge image files at the click of a button.