GhostViewer - See Through Time

GhostViewer is a free, growing online archive of historic photographs from towns, villages, and cities across the United Kingdom, paired with an interactive “then and now” rephotography tool that lets users align historic images with the same view today.

Subject matter

The archive covers locations across England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man — street scenes, market places, civic buildings, churches, bridges, and other recognisable landmarks. Each image is geo-located and tagged by country, county, and town, allowing the collection to be browsed by place as well as searched.

Quantity

The archive currently holds several hundred historic photographs, with contributions arriving regularly from individuals and partner organisations including Geograph Britain and Ireland. A substantial expansion is underway, with several thousand further geo-located images being processed from a private archive of UK footpath walks (from 2010 to 2019)

Format

All material is held as digital scans or digital photographs, displayed on an interactive map and on individual location pages. Many images are also used to generate animated “then and now” comparisons — GIFs and videos dissolving the historic view into the modern equivalent from the same vantage point.

Time period

The collection spans from Victorian-era photographs to images taken within the last few years, with particular depth from the 2010s onward. Older material, including Victorian and Edwardian photographs, is actively sought from contributing societies and archives.

GhostViewer welcomes contributions from local history societies and individuals, with full attribution given to contributors and partner organisations.