How you can use Eagle to organize images on your computer

Until recently, I relied on a series of Dropbox folders and subfolders. Locating images for docs or presentations meant hunting through folders. As I accumulated collections of icons, graphics, illustrations, screenshots, cartoons, and various other images, the folder structure was swamped.

I stumbled upon Eagle recently and it’s been helpful for organizing my images and other files. I still use Apple Photos and Google Photos to store and back up my family photos. But for all other images—screenshots, illustrations, icons—I use Eagle.

Here’s Why You’ll Find Eagle Useful

Grab and save images from the web. Use Eagle to collect images online to spice up your documents and presentations. The browser plug-ins work with Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge. Once installed, you just right-click on any image on the web to add it to your library. Better yet: Click on multiple images to save a bunch at a time. Or save an entire site automatically. Eagle will scroll and capture the full site as an image.

Take screenshots. Rather than using a separate tool, you can use Eagle to grab a whole page or any part of a page you select and add it directly to your library. I’ve used CloudApp for screenshots in the past, but it’s clunky for finding and organizing past screenshots. Planning a new project? Use Eagle to create an inspiration collection of other cool projects online, or a mood board with images/designs/graphics that inspire you.

Find images quickly. I often find myself searching my computer for particular kinds of images. For certain slides, I may need a vertical image. Or a certain GIF. Or I’m looking for something I know I downloaded last week. Now I filter images within Eagle for those and other search parameters. You can even sort for images of a certain color. Get an instant view of the results and drag them to other apps or export in whatever format or size you need. That saves time when you’re drafting new documents or slides.

Avoid wasting time manually filing images. Eagle maintains automatic Smart Albums. You don’t have to manually move images in or out. Images that fit whatever description you set are auto-pulled into the appropriate Smart Album. I have ones for GIFs, screenshots, vertical images, and new images. Eagle also has an auto-import function. That means it can watch certain folders on your computer, and when you add something to that folder, it gets added to Eagle. The advantage of Smart Albums and auto-imports? You save the time you would have spent moving files around.

Organize other files too, like PDFs, docs, and anything else. Eagle works with 90 file types. I’ve started using it to organize nonimage files too, particularly PDFs. I’m also planning to use it for presentations and audio files.

Because it has great tagging, filtering, annotations, and previews, it’s a handy way to keep all sorts of files organized.

You can even add and organize fonts within Eagle.
You can use it for video files, including for time-specific notes and annotations, so you remember which part of the video to use later on.
Save YouTube or Vimeo videos.
Save bookmarks to organize sites with.

Price, $30. You can try it for a month before deciding to pay to keep it. Pay once. No subscription. Now that I have dozens of subscriptions, I appreciate being able to pay a modest fee for a lifetime license; there’s a 30% discount for educators or students.