Is an image as ".jpe" an ordinary JPEG, just with a different file extension?

Question

I have a little dozen images with the file extension *.jpe. All the others are the well-known *.jpg, *.jpeg and so on.

Can these images be renamed from *.jpe to *.jpg?

Is there any difference to *.jpg?

Here is an example of such a file:

Why the file extension *.jpe? Is it arbitrary?

identify -verbose 02C25DD7-8C81-4CD8-9FE3-1296EC16A024.jpe
Image:
  Filename: 02C25DD7-8C81-4CD8-9FE3-1296EC16A024.jpe
  Format: JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group JFIF format)
  Mime type: image/jpeg
  Class: DirectClass
  Geometry: 768x1024+0+0
  Units: Undefined
  Colorspace: sRGB
  Type: TrueColor
  Base type: Undefined
  Endianness: Undefined
  Depth: 8-bit
  Channel depth:
    Red: 8-bit
    Green: 8-bit
    Blue: 8-bit
  Channel statistics:
    Pixels: 786432
    Red:
      min: 0  (0)
      max: 255 (1)
      mean: 156.473 (0.613618)
      median: 159 (0.623529)
      standard deviation: 43.7249 (0.17147)
      kurtosis: 1.09693
      skewness: -1.26094
      entropy: 0.894501
    Green:
      min: 0  (0)
      max: 255 (1)
      mean: 153.452 (0.601772)
      median: 158 (0.619608)
      standard deviation: 48.5381 (0.190345)
      kurtosis: 0.675939
      skewness: -1.21666
      entropy: 0.903505
    Blue:
      min: 0  (0)
      max: 255 (1)
      mean: 147.477 (0.578339)
      median: 152 (0.596078)
      standard deviation: 49.4681 (0.193993)
      kurtosis: 0.165395
      skewness: -1.01939
      entropy: 0.916593
  Image statistics:
    Overall:
      min: 0  (0)
      max: 255 (1)
      mean: 152.467 (0.59791)
      median: 156.333 (0.613072)
      standard deviation: 47.2437 (0.185269)
      kurtosis: 0.62226
      skewness: -1.1685
      entropy: 0.904867
  Rendering intent: Perceptual
  Gamma: 0.454545
  Chromaticity:
    red primary: (0.64,0.33)
    green primary: (0.3,0.6)
    blue primary: (0.15,0.06)
    white point: (0.3127,0.329)
  Matte color: grey74
  Background color: white
  Border color: srgb(223,223,223)
  Transparent color: none
  Interlace: None
  Intensity: Undefined
  Compose: Over
  Page geometry: 768x1024+0+0
  Dispose: Undefined
  Iterations: 0
  Compression: JPEG
  Quality: 75
  Orientation: Undefined
  Properties:
    date:create: 2021-12-16T17:11:38+00:00
    date:modify: 2003-12-13T11:44:02+00:00
    jpeg:colorspace: 2
    jpeg:sampling-factor: 2x2,1x1,1x1
    signature: 580f2e80052d85bcd9e9c82276fade1d269a99d409ca57bee5b5000f3ab27695
  Artifacts:
    verbose: true
  Tainted: False
  Filesize: 164290B
  Number pixels: 786432
  Pixels per second: 35.9894MP
  User time: 0.020u
  Elapsed time: 0:01.021
  Version: ImageMagick 7.1.0-31 Q16-HDRI x86_64 19966 https://imagemagick.org

Answer 1

If identify says its format is JPEG, you can rename it to .jpg or .jpeg and use it normally (if the file isn't corrupted in any way besides having an incorrect extension). Moreover, some readers or editors can recognise it as a JPEG even without a correct extension.

How did you get these files? The image extension could be a result of stripping .jpeg down to 3 letters by some legacy image editing tool which assumes all extensions should contain 3 characters, but these are pretty rare nowadays.

Answer 2

According to Wikipedia all of these extensions

.jpg, .jpeg, .jpe
.jif, .jfif, .jfi

are a valid JPEG file extension.

The most common filename extensions for files employing JPEG compression are .jpg and .jpeg, though .jpe, .jfif and .jif are also used.

So:

• You can rename them to *.jpg
• There is no difference to *.jpg
• File extension *.jpe may be a preferred extension for JPEG files of the source of the images

Answer 3

The one problem I can think of is if these files are used by some software, and called upon explicitly by name. If so, then renaming the extension may cause a 'file not found' error.

Answer 4

Just rename the picture that has *.jpe into a jpeg. You can do it by clicking the left side of your mouse and choosing rename or long-press the picture and find the option rename.