39.17 Images

To display an image in an Emacs buffer, you must first create an image descriptor, then use it as a display specifier in the display property of text that is displayed (see Display Property).

Emacs is usually able to display images when it is run on a graphical terminal. Images cannot be displayed in a text terminal, on certain graphical terminals that lack the support for this, or if Emacs is compiled without image support. You can use the function display-images-p to determine if images can in principle be displayed (see Display Feature Testing).

• Image Formats		Supported image formats.
• Image Descriptors		How to specify an image for use in :display.
• XBM Images		Special features for XBM format.
• XPM Images		Special features for XPM format.
• ImageMagick Images		Special features available through ImageMagick.
• SVG Images		Creating and manipulating SVG images.
• Other Image Types		Various other formats are supported.
• Defining Images		Convenient ways to define an image for later use.
• Showing Images		Convenient ways to display an image once it is defined.
• Multi-Frame Images		Some images contain more than one frame.
• Image Cache		Internal mechanisms of image display.