Getting Started

Summary

Jade GT runs in your browser. Drop photos in, edit them across six tabs, and commit the batch when you are ready. This page covers loading files, picking a saving mode, and the workspace layout.

• Bring photos in

  Pick a few files, open a whole folder, or bring metadata from your phone. Drop anywhere on the empty card works too. Jade GT remembers your session if you close the tab.

• Pick a saving strategy

  Export Mode writes new copies. Direct Save overwrites your originals in place. The toggle sits at the top of the Photos panel.

• Work across six tabs

  Preview, Location, Tags, Compress, Rename, and EXIF Info. Every edit stages first; nothing hits disk until you commit.

The workspace after loading a folder of photos. Gallery on the left, Details Panel on the right.

Loading your photos

Jade GT opens to an empty card with a demo hero at the top, three starting points below, and a drop area for everything.

Try the demo first

The lead card on the empty workspace loads 10 geotagged photos from Bayou Bartholomew (Kenny's 2026-02-25 shoot) in a few seconds. It also loads the matching GPX track, so the Location tab and Map Studio draw the trail right away. The demo runs in sandbox mode: nothing saves to your browser or to disk. A red-flag banner shows at the top of the workspace while the demo photos are loaded. Click Clear demo to wipe both the photos and the track. This is the fastest way to feel the workflow before you hook up your own files.

Below the demo card, pick the starting point that fits your shoot.

• Pick a few photos

  The first path. Opens your system file picker so you can grab individual files from any folder. Best for trying the workflow or working on a handful of frames.

• Open a whole folder

  The second path. Connects Jade GT to a shoot folder for batch work. Desktop Chromium only. On Safari, Firefox, or mobile the button hides on its own, because those browsers don't support folder access.

• Bring metadata from your phone

  The third path. Opens Phone Metadata so you can pull location and captions off a phone photo and apply them to the batch. Useful when your phone shot caught the spot or the keywords you want.

• Drag and drop

  Drop image files or whole folders anywhere on the empty card. Same result as the picker, fewer clicks.

The empty-state entry card. Each path goes to its own picker; "Open a whole folder" hides on browsers that don't support folder access.

Mobile workflow

Mobile browsers don't support folder access, so Open a whole folder stays hidden on phones and tablets. Use Pick a few photos to grab images from your gallery, or use Phone Metadata to send a reference photo from your phone to a desktop session.

Session persistence

Jade GT saves your file connections and staged edits in this browser on this device. Close the tab and come back later. Jade GT restores the session on its own. The empty-state card only shows when the session is truly empty.

Choosing a saving strategy

Before you start editing, decide how you want changes to land on disk. The Saving Strategy toggle sits at the top of the Photos panel.

Grey dot for Export Mode, green dot for Direct Save. The toggle lives next to the Photos title.

Export Mode (default on mobile) Direct Save (Pro, Chromium only)

A grey dot marks Export Mode. Jade GT writes new copies of your photos with the updated metadata and offers them as a download.

• Single photo downloads a standard image file.
• Multiple photos ride together in one ZIP so you skip a download prompt for every file.
• Source folder stays untouched.

A green dot marks Direct Save. Jade GT updates your original files in place on disk.

• Works on Chrome, Edge, Brave, and Arc (any Chromium browser that supports folder access).
• Not available on Safari or Firefox. Those browsers stay in Export Mode.
• Safety fallback: if a direct save fails because permission changed mid-session, Jade GT switches to a download so you never lose work.

Why mobile is Export Mode only

Mobile browsers don't support folder access, and Direct Save needs that support to write files in place. Mobile sessions always download a copy instead.

The welcome dialog

The first time you launch Jade GT, a welcome dialog appears with a 3-step quick-start guide.

The welcome dialog. Click Start Tagging to dismiss, or tick the checkbox to skip it on future launches.

• Open your photos

  The first step points at the three starting points on the empty card and the drop area.

• Optimize your assets

  The second step points at the Location, Tags, and Rename tabs as the main editing tabs. Pro users also see a note about the Mobile GPS Logger.

• Review and commit

  The third step shows the Commit button as the way to write your staged edits to disk.

A Don't show again toggle remembers your choice for next time. The dialog is per-device; clearing your browser data brings it back.

The workspace at a glance

Once you load photos, the workspace splits side by side: the Photos panel on the left, the Details Panel on the right.

On phones the app runs as a single-panel shell with a bottom tab bar: Photos, Logger, and Settings. The Photos tab tags one photo at a time. Pick a photo, fill in the fields, then save it to your phone or send it to your desktop.

The mobile Photos tab. Tap Pick a Photo to start tagging. The Photos, Logger, and Settings tabs sit at the bottom.

Logger settings on mobile

On phones the Mobile Shell shows a bottom tab bar (Photos / Logger / Settings). Logger preferences (recording mode, stationary detection, live map, auto-save, units) live on the Settings tab under the LOGGER group. Changes apply to the Logger right away.

Pick Light, Dark, or Auto on your phone

The mobile Settings tab has an Appearance row at the top. Choose Light, Dark, or Auto (Auto follows your device). Your choice covers the whole phone app, including the Logger and your Saved tracks.

The Appearance row at the top of the Settings tab. Pick Light, Dark, or Auto to set the look for the whole phone app.

Tap a Recent photo to keep editing

When you tag a photo on your phone, it shows up in Recent. Tap it again to reopen the editor right where you left off; your typing is still there. Closing the editor no longer throws your work away, and the editor now fits the screen with less scrolling.

The on-device tagging editor. The preview stays capped so the fields fit on one screen, and the save buttons stay pinned at the bottom.

The Details Panel shows six tabs. Each one works on the current selection: a single photo when one is selected, every selected photo at once when several are.

Tab	What it does
Preview	Triage flags, image preview, camera and location cards, a list of staged edits.
Location	Set GPS by search, paste, preset, or GPX track match.
Tags	Keywords, captions, rights, IPTC fields, Stock Readiness dashboard.
Compress	Re-encode to AVIF, WebP, or JPEG with a live size estimate.
Rename	Batch rename with patterns like {date}_{index}.
EXIF Info	Shift capture times, inspect every EXIF field, run the Privacy Scrub.

The staging model

Jade GT never writes to disk as you type. Every edit stages first. A pulsing dot lights up the tab that has pending changes, and the Commit button in the panel header shows a running count. Changes only hit disk when you commit, and once you commit, you cannot undo the change inside the app. See Review & Commit.

Command palette

Press Cmd+K (or Ctrl+K on Windows and Linux) to open a searchable launcher for every action in the app: open photos, open Phone Metadata, jump to a tab, toggle the theme, find the keyboard shortcut sheet. Type a few letters to filter. Enter runs the highlighted action; Esc closes the palette.

One keyword staged: the Tags tab carries a pulsing dot and the Commit button shows a running count.

flowchart LR
  A[Open Photos] --> B[Select &amp; triage<br/>in Photos panel]
  B --> C[Edit in tabs<br/>Location · Tags · Rename · ...]
  C --> D[Changes auto-stage<br/>tab dot pulses]

↓

flowchart LR
  E[Review Hub<br/>per-category checkboxes] --> F{Saving strategy}
  F -->|Direct Save| G[Write in place<br/>Pro · Chromium]
  F -->|Export Mode| H[Download ZIP]

Selecting photos

The gallery uses the same selection patterns as your file manager.

• Click

  Click a photo to select it. The thumbnail gets a colored ring and the Details Panel updates.

• Shift + Click

  Click a second photo with Shift held to select everything from the first to the second.

• Ctrl + Click

  Toggle individual photos in and out of the selection. On Mac, use Cmd + click.

• Select all / Clear

  The selection controls at the top of the Photos panel select everything or clear the selection.

The Photos panel action drawer. Click the hamburger icon next to the Photos title to slide it in.

How batch editing works

When you select more than one photo, every edit applies to every photo in the selection. Set a copyright in the Tags tab and it writes to every selected photo. To edit one photo, click it on its own first.

Drag a photo straight out of the app

Grab a thumbnail from the Photos panel and drag it out of the browser window. Drop it on:

• a Finder or Files window to copy the photo into a folder
• the Desktop to drop a copy you can grab again later
• a Mail compose window (Apple Mail, Outlook, Gmail in a tab) to attach the photo to your draft
• a chat app that accepts file drops (Slack, Discord, Messages)

The photo that travels out carries everything you have already saved. Edits that still show the staged dot haven't hit disk yet, so they don't ride along. Commit first if you want the new metadata in the dragged copy.

One photo at a time

Drag carries the photo under your cursor, even when several are selected. Same way Lightroom and Capture One handle it.

Always a copy

Dragging out makes a copy. Your original file on disk stays untouched. Use Direct Save and the Review Hub when you want the edits saved back into place.

Free vs Pro

Jade GT has two tiers: a Free Forever tier for hobbyists and a Pro subscription for working photographers.

• Free tier

  Up to 10 photos per batch, 20 edits per day, Export Mode only, no RAW. A daily-limit counter sits in the Review Hub footer.

• Pro tier

  Unlimited batches and daily edits, Direct Save, RAW with sidecar files (the small .xmp companion Lightroom reads), the full ExifTool engine (the metadata writer at the heart of the app), batch Stock Readiness analysis, full GPX track import and nearest-point matching.

Trying a Pro-only feature on the Free tier opens an Upgrade dialog. Nothing turns off silently. See the Subscriptions & Pro Features page for the full matrix and billing details.

Troubleshooting

The Open a whole folder option is missing

You are either on a mobile browser or on Safari/Firefox. Folder access only works in Chrome, Edge, Brave, Arc, and Opera on desktop. Use Pick a few photos or switch to one of those browsers.

Drag and drop isn't working

Drop the files anywhere on the empty-state card. If you are dragging from a download manager or a remote share, copy the files to a local folder first; some browsers refuse to drop directly from a network location.

The Direct Save toggle is disabled

Direct Save is Pro-only and only works in Chrome, Edge, Brave, and Arc. Click the Upgrade button in the header to see Pro pricing, or stay in Export Mode and download your edits as a ZIP.

Refreshing the tab lost my staged edits

Jade GT saves your file connections and staged edits in this browser on this device. If you cleared site data, used a private or incognito window, or switched devices, the session can't restore. Avoid private windows for long sessions.

The welcome dialog won't stop showing

The "Don't show again" toggle saves your choice in this browser. If you clear site data, switch browsers, or use a private window, the choice resets and the dialog returns. Tick the toggle once more and the dialog will stay hidden until you clear the data again.

Related guides

• Preview tab

  The first tab most users open. Triage, identity at a glance, and a list of every staged edit on the current photo.

• Location tab

  Set GPS on photos by search, paste, preset, or GPX track match.

• Tags tab

  Keywords, captions, rights, and the Stock Readiness dashboard.

• Review & Commit

  The final pane that writes every staged change to disk.

• Subscriptions & Pro Features

  Full Free vs Pro feature matrix and billing details.