I built a free open-source photo & video organizer for 27,000+ files (no cloud, no subscription)

#opensource #photography #node #electron

I had 27,000+ photos and videos scattered across a Linux PC, external SSD, and multiple USB sticks. Every existing solution either required cloud access, a subscription, or was too complex for non-technical family members.

So I built FotoApp — a free, open-source local photo & video organizer.

What it does

Scan folders recursively — finds all photos and videos (JPG, PNG, RAW, MP4, MKV, MOV...)
Detect duplicates by MD5 hash — shows groups, lets you mark which to keep
GPS map view — media pinned on a Leaflet map, with automatic reverse geocoding via Nominatim (no API key, no data sent to Google)
Smart export — filenames like Belgium_Brussels_12_06_2026.jpg, organized into year/month folders
Google Takeout support — reads the .jpg.json sidecar files for date and GPS fallback
Dashboard — stats by year, camera model, country (with flag emoji 🌍), and source folder
Video support — thumbnails, metadata, duration shown alongside photos
Multi-language UI — switch between NL / EN / FR / DE in the app header

Tech stack

Layer	Tech
Desktop wrapper	Electron
Backend	Node.js + Express
Database	SQLite (better-sqlite3)
Image processing	sharp + exifr
Maps	Leaflet + Nominatim
Frontend	Vanilla JS (no framework)

No framework overhead, no build step. Just open and it works.

Privacy first

Everything runs locally. No cloud upload, no account required, no telemetry. The only external call is to Nominatim for reverse geocoding (OpenStreetMap), and that can be disabled.