XIFF

Extended Image File Format

image/vnd.xiff Released 1994 · by Keyfile Corporation

The image/vnd.xiff MIME type represents the Extended Image File Format (XIFF), a proprietary variant of the TIFF architecture developed by Keyfile Corporation in the mid-1990s. Designed specifically for enterprise document management and workflow systems (such as Keyfile Workflow), XIFF extended the standard TIFF specification to encapsulate multi-page scanned documents, advanced document annotations, routing slips, and administrative metadata. It is now entirely obsolete.

Legacy & Proprietary Production Ready

Technical Specifications

MIME Type

image/vnd.xiff

Extensions

.xif

Container

TIFF-based Proprietary Container

Compression

CCITT Group 3 / Group 4 & LZW & Uncompressed

Algorithms

CCITT Group 4LZWNone

Color Depth

1-bit (Monochrome), 8-bit (Grayscale), 24-bit (RGB)

Metadata

None

Capabilities

Transparency

Animation

Progressive Loading

Alpha Channel

HDR Support

Official Specification

Aliases: image/xif

Magic Bytes & HTTP Headers

File Signature (Magic Bytes)

49 49 2A 00 or 4D 4D 00 2A

ASCII: II*\x00 or MM\x00*

HTTP Headers

Content-Type: image/vnd.xiff

HTML Accept Attribute

accept="image/vnd.xiff, .xif"

Browser Support Matrix

Browser	Status	Min Version
Chrome	Not Supported	—
Firefox	Not Supported	—
Safari	Not Supported	—
Edge	Not Supported	—
Internet Explorer	Not Supported	Legacy

Advantages & Limitations

Advantages

Pioneered early enterprise document workflow integration by binding administrative routing data directly to the document image file
Leveraged efficient fax compression standards to keep storage requirements low on 1990s server infrastructure

Limitations

Completely proprietary and obsolete; Keyfile Corporation's software ecosystem no longer exists
Causes widespread MIME type identification conflicts due to sharing the exact same binary header signature as standard TIFF files
Zero support in modern operating systems or web browsers

Developer Code Snippets

import magic
# Libmagic will identify XIFF files as standard TIFFs due to the shared 49 49 2A 00 / 4D 4D 00 2A header
print(magic.from_file('document.xif', mime=True)) # Outputs 'image/tiff'

const FileType = require('file-type');
const type = await FileType.fromFile('document.xif');
console.log(type?.mime); // Usually resolves to 'image/tiff'. Extension checking is required for 'image/vnd.xiff'.

import (
    "bytes"
    "net/http"
)
// http.DetectContentType will read the TIFF magic bytes and return 'image/tiff'.

$mime = mime_content_type('document.xif');
echo $mime; // Standard PHP installations will resolve this to 'image/tiff'

File Detection Steps

How to programmatically detect a image/vnd.xiff file by reading its raw bytes:

1 Check the first 4 bytes for standard TIFF little-endian (49 49 2A 00) or big-endian (4D 4D 00 2A) signatures.
2 Because XIFF shares its header identically with standard TIFF files, file sniffers like libmagic will typically identify it as 'image/tiff'.
3 Distinguishing XIFF from standard TIFF requires inspecting the TIFF Image File Directory (IFD) for proprietary Keyfile tag definitions.

Software Support

K

Keyfile Workflow (Legacy)

Conversion Tools

Share & Embed

Markdown Badge

[![XIFF Format](https://freewebptojpg.com/mime/image/xiff/badge.svg)](https://freewebptojpg.com/mime/image/xiff)

Interactive iframe Widget

<iframe src="https://freewebptojpg.com/mime/image/xiff/embed" width="100%" height="280" style="border:1px solid #cbd5e1;border-radius:8px;" title="XIFF Specs"></iframe>

JSON API

All data on this page is available as a free, open JSON API. Use it in your project, documentation, or tooling.

GET https://freewebptojpg.com/mime/image/xiff.json Open JSON

Free to use

No auth required

CORS enabled

Use from any domain

Cached 24h

Cache-Control headers set

Frequently Asked Questions

What is an XIFF file?

An XIFF (.xif) file is a proprietary, TIFF-based document format created by Keyfile Corporation in the 1990s. It was used in enterprise document management systems to store scanned pages along with workflow routing slips and user annotations.

Is XIFF just a standard TIFF file?

Structurally, yes. XIFF is built on top of the TIFF specification and shares the same core image file directory (IFD) layout, but it introduces proprietary private tags to store workflow metadata and annotations that standard TIFF viewers ignore.

Can I open an .xif file today?

Modern web browsers and consumer image viewers cannot open XIFF files. Because the format is obsolete and tied to defunct enterprise software, viewing or converting them requires legacy specialized tools or custom parsing scripts to extract the underlying image streams.