How to check file MIME type with javascript before upload?

As stated in other answers, you can check the mime type by checking the signature of the file in the first bytes of the file.

But what other answers are doing is loading the entire file in memory in order to check the signature, which is very wasteful and could easily freeze your browser if you select a big file by accident or not.

/** * Load the mime type based on the signature of the first bytes of the file * @param {File} file A instance of File * @param {Function} callback Callback with the result * @author Victor www.vitim.us * @date 2017-03-23 */ function loadMime(file, callback) { //List of known mimes var mimes = [ { mime: 'image/jpeg', pattern: [0xFF, 0xD8, 0xFF], mask: [0xFF, 0xFF, 0xFF], }, { mime: 'image/png', pattern: [0x89, 0x50, 0x4E, 0x47], mask: [0xFF, 0xFF, 0xFF, 0xFF], } // you can expand this list @see https://mimesniff.spec.whatwg.org/#matching-an-image-type-pattern ]; function check(bytes, mime) { for (var i = 0, l = mime.mask.length; i < l; ++i) { if ((bytes[i] & mime.mask[i]) - mime.pattern[i] !== 0) { return false; } } return true; } var blob = file.slice(0, 4); //read the first 4 bytes of the file var reader = new FileReader(); reader.onloadend = function(e) { if (e.target.readyState === FileReader.DONE) { var bytes = new Uint8Array(e.target.result); for (var i=0, l = mimes.length; i Browser:" + file.type); } return callback("Mime: unknown
Browser:" + file.type); } }; reader.readAsArrayBuffer(blob); } //when selecting a file on the input fileInput.onchange = function() { loadMime(fileInput.files[0], function(mime) { //print the output to the screen output.innerHTML = mime; }); };

For anyone who's looking to not implement this themselves, Sindresorhus has created a utility that works in the browser and has the header-to-mime mappings for most documents you could want.

https://github.com/sindresorhus/file-type

You could combine Vitim.us's suggestion of only reading in the first X bytes to avoid loading everything into memory with using this utility (example in es6):

import fileType from 'file-type'; // or wherever you load the dependency

const blob = file.slice(0, fileType.minimumBytes);

const reader = new FileReader();
reader.onloadend = function(e) {
  if (e.target.readyState !== FileReader.DONE) {
    return;
  }

  const bytes = new Uint8Array(e.target.result);
  const { ext, mime } = fileType.fromBuffer(bytes);

  // ext is the desired extension and mime is the mimetype
};
reader.readAsArrayBuffer(blob);

If you just want to check if the file uploaded is an image you can just try to load it into <img> tag an check for any error callback.

Example:

var input = document.getElementsByTagName('input')[0];
var reader = new FileReader();

reader.onload = function (e) {
    imageExists(e.target.result, function(exists){
        if (exists) {

            // Do something with the image file.. 

        } else {

            // different file format

        }
    });
};

reader.readAsDataURL(input.files[0]);


function imageExists(url, callback) {
    var img = new Image();
    img.onload = function() { callback(true); };
    img.onerror = function() { callback(false); };
    img.src = url;
}

This is what you have to do

var fileVariable =document.getElementsById('fileId').files[0];

If you want to check for image file types then

if(fileVariable.type.match('image.*'))
{
 alert('its an image');
}

Here is a Typescript implementation that supports webp. This is based on the JavaScript answer by Vitim.us.

interface Mime {
  mime: string;
  pattern: (number | undefined)[];
}

// tslint:disable number-literal-format
// tslint:disable no-magic-numbers
const imageMimes: Mime[] = [
  {
    mime: 'image/png',
    pattern: [0x89, 0x50, 0x4e, 0x47]
  },
  {
    mime: 'image/jpeg',
    pattern: [0xff, 0xd8, 0xff]
  },
  {
    mime: 'image/gif',
    pattern: [0x47, 0x49, 0x46, 0x38]
  },
  {
    mime: 'image/webp',
    pattern: [0x52, 0x49, 0x46, 0x46, undefined, undefined, undefined, undefined, 0x57, 0x45, 0x42, 0x50, 0x56, 0x50],
  }
  // You can expand this list @see https://mimesniff.spec.whatwg.org/#matching-an-image-type-pattern
];
// tslint:enable no-magic-numbers
// tslint:enable number-literal-format

function isMime(bytes: Uint8Array, mime: Mime): boolean {
  return mime.pattern.every((p, i) => !p || bytes[i] === p);
}

function validateImageMimeType(file: File, callback: (b: boolean) => void) {
  const numBytesNeeded = Math.max(...imageMimes.map(m => m.pattern.length));
  const blob = file.slice(0, numBytesNeeded); // Read the needed bytes of the file

  const fileReader = new FileReader();

  fileReader.onloadend = e => {
    if (!e || !fileReader.result) return;

    const bytes = new Uint8Array(fileReader.result as ArrayBuffer);

    const valid = imageMimes.some(mime => isMime(bytes, mime));

    callback(valid);
  };

  fileReader.readAsArrayBuffer(blob);
}

// When selecting a file on the input
fileInput.onchange = () => {
  const file = fileInput.files && fileInput.files[0];
  if (!file) return;

  validateImageMimeType(file, valid => {
    if (!valid) {
      alert('Not a valid image file.');
    }
  });
};

As Drake states this could be done with FileReader. However, what I present here is a functional version. Take in consideration that the big problem with doing this with JavaScript is to reset the input file. Well, this restricts to only JPG (for other formats you will have to change the mime type and the magic number):

<form id="form-id">
  <input type="file" id="input-id" accept="image/jpeg"/>
</form>

<script type="text/javascript">
    $(function(){
        $("#input-id").on('change', function(event) {
            var file = event.target.files[0];
            if(file.size>=2*1024*1024) {
                alert("JPG images of maximum 2MB");
                $("#form-id").get(0).reset(); //the tricky part is to "empty" the input file here I reset the form.
                return;
            }

            if(!file.type.match('image/jp.*')) {
                alert("only JPG images");
                $("#form-id").get(0).reset(); //the tricky part is to "empty" the input file here I reset the form.
                return;
            }

            var fileReader = new FileReader();
            fileReader.onload = function(e) {
                var int32View = new Uint8Array(e.target.result);
                //verify the magic number
                // for JPG is 0xFF 0xD8 0xFF 0xE0 (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_file_signatures)
                if(int32View.length>4 && int32View[0]==0xFF && int32View[1]==0xD8 && int32View[2]==0xFF && int32View[3]==0xE0) {
                    alert("ok!");
                } else {
                    alert("only valid JPG images");
                    $("#form-id").get(0).reset(); //the tricky part is to "empty" the input file here I reset the form.
                    return;
                }
            };
            fileReader.readAsArrayBuffer(file);
        });
    });
</script>

Take in consideration that this was tested on latest versions of Firefox and Chrome, and on IExplore 10.

For a complete list of mime types see Wikipedia.

For a complete list of magic number see Wikipedia.

I needed to check for a few more file types.

Following up the excellent answer given by Drakes, I came up with the below code after I found this website with a very extensive table of file types and their headers. Both in Hex and String.

I also needed an asynchronous function to deal with many files and other problems related to the project I'm working that does not matter here.

Here is the code in vanilla javascript.

// getFileMimeType
// @param {Object} the file object created by the input[type=file] DOM element.
// @return {Object} a Promise that resolves with the MIME type as argument or undefined
// if no MIME type matches were found.
const getFileMimeType = file => {

    // Making the function async.
    return new Promise(resolve => {
        let fileReader = new FileReader();
        fileReader.onloadend = event => {
            const byteArray = new Uint8Array(event.target.result);

            // Checking if it's JPEG. For JPEG we need to check the first 2 bytes.
            // We can check further if more specific type is needed.
            if(byteArray[0] == 255 && byteArray[1] == 216){
                resolve('image/jpeg');
                return;
            }

            // If it's not JPEG we can check for signature strings directly.
            // This is only the case when the bytes have a readable character.
            const td = new TextDecoder("utf-8");
            const headerString = td.decode(byteArray);

            // Array to be iterated [<string signature>, <MIME type>]
            const mimeTypes = [
                // Images
                ['PNG', 'image/png'],
                // Audio
                ['ID3', 'audio/mpeg'],// MP3
                // Video
                ['ftypmp4', 'video/mp4'],// MP4
                ['ftypisom', 'video/mp4'],// MP4
                // HTML
                ['<!DOCTYPE html>', 'text/html'],
                // PDF
                ['%PDF', 'application/pdf']
                // Add the needed files for your case.
            ];

            // Iterate over the required types.
            for(let i = 0;i < mimeTypes.length;i++){
                // If a type matches we return the MIME type
                if(headerString.indexOf(mimeTypes[i][0]) > -1){
                    resolve(mimeTypes[i][1]);
                    return;
                }
            }

            // If not is found we resolve with a blank argument
            resolve();

        }
        // Slice enough bytes to get readable strings.
        // I chose 32 arbitrarily. Note that some headers are offset by
        // a number of bytes.
        fileReader.readAsArrayBuffer(file.slice(0,32));
    });

};

// The input[type=file] DOM element.
const fileField = document.querySelector('#file-upload');
// Event to detect when the user added files.
fileField.onchange = event => {

    // We iterate over each file and log the file name and it's MIME type.
    // This iteration is asynchronous.
    Array.from(fileField.files, async file => {
        console.log(file.name, await getFileMimeType(file));
    });

};

Notice that in the getFileMimeType function you can employ 2 approaches to find the correct MIME type.

Search the bytes directly. Search for Strings after converting the bytes to string.

I used the first approach with JPEG because what makes it identifiable are the first 2 bytes and those bytes are not readable string characters.

With the rest of the file types I could check for readable string character signatures. For example: [video/mp4] -> 'ftypmp4' or 'ftypisom'

If you need to support a file that is not on the Gary Kessler's list, you can console.log() the bytes or converted string to find a proper signature for the obscure file you need to support.

Note1: The Gary Kessler's list has been updated and the mp4 signatures are different now, you should check it when implementing this. Note2: the Array.from is designed to use a .map like function as it second argument.

Here is an extension of Roberto14's answer that does the following:

THIS WILL ONLY ALLOW IMAGES

Checks if FileReader is available and falls back to extension checking if it is not available.

Gives an error alert if not an image

If it is an image it loads a preview

** You should still do server side validation, this is more a convenience for the end user than anything else. But it is handy!

<form id="myform">
    <input type="file" id="myimage" onchange="readURL(this)" />
    <img id="preview" src="#" alt="Image Preview" />
</form>

<script>
function readURL(input) {
    if (window.FileReader && window.Blob) {
        if (input.files && input.files[0]) {
            var reader = new FileReader();
            reader.onload = function (e) {
                var img = new Image();
                img.onload = function() {
                    var preview = document.getElementById('preview');
                    preview.src = e.target.result;
                    };
                img.onerror = function() { 
                    alert('error');
                    input.value = '';
                    };
                img.src = e.target.result;
                }
            reader.readAsDataURL(input.files[0]);
            }
        }
    else {
        var ext = input.value.split('.');
        ext = ext[ext.length-1].toLowerCase();      
        var arrayExtensions = ['jpg' , 'jpeg', 'png', 'bmp', 'gif'];
        if (arrayExtensions.lastIndexOf(ext) == -1) {
            alert('error');
            input.value = '';
            }
        else {
            var preview = document.getElementById('preview');
            preview.setAttribute('alt', 'Browser does not support preview.');
            }
        }
    }
</script>

Here's a minimal typescript/promise util for the browser;

export const getFileHeader = (file: File): Promise<string> => {
  return new Promise(resolve => {
    const headerBytes = file.slice(0, 4); // Read the first 4 bytes of the file
    const fileReader = new FileReader();
    fileReader.onloadend = (e: ProgressEvent<FileReader>) => {
      const arr = new Uint8Array(e?.target?.result as ArrayBufferLike).subarray(
        0,
        4,
      );
      let header = '';
      for (let i = 0; i < arr.length; i++) {
        header += arr[i].toString(16);
      }
      resolve(header);
    };
    fileReader.readAsArrayBuffer(headerBytes);
  });
};

Use like so in your validation (I needed a PDF check);

// https://mimesniff.spec.whatwg.org/#matching-an-image-type-pattern
const pdfBytePattern = "25504446"
const fileHeader = await getFileHeader(file)
const isPdf = fileHeader === pdfBytePattern // => true

For Png files you can do even more checking than just checking for some magic header bytes, as Png files have a particular file format that you can check.

TLDR: there are a series of chunks that must be in a specific order, and each chunk has a crc error correction code that you can check if it is valid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Network_Graphics#File_format

I have made a little library that checks that the chunk layout is correct, and it checks that the crc code for each chunk is valid. Ready to consume as a npm package here:

https://www.npmjs.com/package/png-validator

Short answer is no.

As you note the browsers derive type from the file extension. Mac preview also seems to run off the extension. I'm assuming its because its faster reading the file name contained in the pointer, rather than looking up and reading the file on disk.

I made a copy of a jpg renamed with png.

I was able to consistently get the following from both images in chrome (should work in modern browsers).

ÿØÿàJFIFÿþ;CREATOR: gd-jpeg v1.0 (using IJG JPEG v62), quality = 90

Which you could hack out a String.indexOf('jpeg') check for image type.

Here is a fiddle to explore http://jsfiddle.net/bamboo/jkZ2v/1/

The ambigious line I forgot to comment in the example

console.log( /^(.*)$/m.exec(window.atob( image.src.split(',')[1] )) );

Splits the base64 encoded img data, leaving on the image

Base64 decodes the image

Matches only the first line of the image data

The fiddle code uses base64 decode which wont work in IE9, I did find a nice example using VB script that works in IE http://blog.nihilogic.dk/2008/08/imageinfo-reading-image-metadata-with.html

The code to load the image was taken from Joel Vardy, who is doing some cool image canvas resizing client side before uploading which may be of interest https://joelvardy.com/writing/javascript-image-upload