Filee: A Drag and Drop Converter for 266 Formats With No Uploads

By Indie Kings | October 26, 2026

Updated October 26, 2026: Filee, an open source file converter with a donut that opens at your cursor, has climbed to 13,302 GitHub stars, converting more than 260 formats entirely offline, and the developer has answered the usual trust question with a signed Windows installer and a privacy policy that reads like a list of the only three things it ever contacts.

Image: Manila folders via Wikimedia Commons.

A donut at the cursor

The KnifeLemon/Filee repository describes a free, open source file converter you use by dragging: hold a key, Ctrl on Windows, Option on macOS, drag files and drop them on a format in the donut that opens at your cursor. No app window opens first; the formats appear where you already are, and only the ones that make sense for the files you are dragging. Press Tab or spin the mouse wheel while the donut is open and it flips over to reveal less common formats and tools, and a toolbar per file type, arranged by drag and drop, carries presets for quality, size and DPI, PDF pages and compression, video and audio output, and custom folders and file names. Multi file drops convert in parallel, routes with several steps like HWP to HWPX to DOCX are found automatically, watch folders convert everything that lands in them, and a Crop slice opens pictures one by one so only the framed part gets saved.

The format ledger and the engines behind it

The README's conversion table is enormous: images from JPG to camera RAW, DICOM and iPhone Live Photos, vector formats including AI and CDR, documents and spreadsheets, the Korean HWP format, e-books including KEPUB and AZW3, video and audio, subtitles, archives, CAD between DWG and DXF, fonts, data formats, 3D models and geospatial vectors with reprojection to WGS 84. Counting gets fuzzy at the edges, the repo's own description says 263 formats while the README says 266, but the operative line is the asterisk system: unmarked conversions work with nothing else installed, no Office, no Hancom Office, no LibreOffice, while marked formats pull an optional engine only when needed, Ghostscript, LibreOffice, Pandoc, calibre or FFmpeg, downloaded from pinned official locations in engines.json. Dragging straight out of the browser also works: drop a picture or a file link from Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari and Filee saves and converts it, downloading links without the browser's sign in.

Offline by design, signed by hand

Conversion happens entirely on your own computer, nothing is uploaded, no usage data or telemetry is collected, and the privacy policy enumerates the only internet connections: a GitHub version check that can be turned off, engine downloads you choose, and links you click. The code signing section reads like an operator's resume: Windows releases are signed with a Certum open source developer certificate issued personally to the developer, every release is signed and approved by hand, and releases before 2.0.0 were unsigned. Linux runs on X11 for the drag gesture with a drop zone fallback on Wayland, macOS support is a preview build that is not yet notarized, and the app updates itself while keeping your settings and engines. Trendshift currently ranks it as the number one C# repository of the week, which suggests the donut is landing.

App card

Item	Detail
Project	Filee by KnifeLemon (Myeonggu Kim), MIT license
Repo stats	13,302 stars, 854 forks
Interaction	Hold a key, drag files, drop on a donut of formats at the cursor
Format count	About 266 per the README, 263 in the repo description
Engines	Optional and on demand: Ghostscript, LibreOffice, Pandoc, calibre, FFmpeg
Offline	Nothing uploaded, no telemetry, version check optional
Features	Parallel batches, multi step routes, watch folders, donut flip, crop, browser drag in
Platforms	Windows 10/11, Linux x64 and ARM64, macOS preview
Signing	Certum open source certificate, releases signed and approved by hand
Recognition	Trendshift number one C# repository of the week

FAQ

What is Filee?
A free, MIT licensed file converter for Windows, Linux and macOS that works by dragging files onto a donut shaped format picker at your cursor.

How many formats does it support?
The README counts about 266 formats across images, documents, video, audio, e-books, archives, CAD, fonts and more; the repo description says 263.

Does it need Office or LibreOffice installed?
No, unmarked conversions work without any office suite; the optional engines like LibreOffice or FFmpeg are downloaded only when a marked format needs them.

Are files uploaded anywhere?
No, all conversion happens offline on your own computer, and the app collects no telemetry.

Which platforms does it run on?
Windows 10 and 11, Linux x64 and ARM64 with Ubuntu 22.04 or newer, and a macOS preview for 13 and up.

Can I use it from the command line?
Yes, the filee command runs the same engines and presets, with convert and watch subcommands.

Bottom Line

File converters are the oldest junkware category on the internet, which makes an offline, no telemetry, hand signed, MIT licensed one feel almost transgressive. The donut interaction is the memorable part, and correctly so, but the quietly great engineering is the engine registry: conversion routes that stay out of the box for the common cases and pull Ghostscript or FFmpeg only when a specific niche needs it, which is how you get 260 formats without shipping a gigabyte of dependencies to everyone.

Sources

GitHub KnifeLemon/Filee README (interaction model, format table, engines, signing and privacy policy), accessed 26 October 2026
GitHub API repository metadata for KnifeLemon/Filee, accessed 26 October 2026