# Need to make thumnail previews of websites.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 14, 2005, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277 "2005-10-14T20:04:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![noblebaron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e274bd/32.png) [@noblebaron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/noblebaron)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277/1 "2005-10-14T20:04:14Z")

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Hi all,

I need to make a thumbnail preview of a web page. Are there any websites that allow you to type in the URL and create a thumbnailed image of a web page “on the fly?”

Alternatively, any free software around that can do this?

I’ve already tried [thumbshots.org](http://thumbshots.org) (site needs to be in DMOZ) and [Alexa.com](http://Alexa.com) (site needs to be in Alexa and half of the images are outdated.)  
Also, I’ve tried screen capturing, etc., and also image re-sizing but the image quality is just terrible.

As always, any help is appreciated. Thanks,

-NB

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**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277/2 "2005-10-14T20:38:15Z")

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You can use the MSN search engine to do it

Example : [http://tinyurl.com/d8plr](http://tinyurl.com/d8plr)

(Open in Internet Explorer, it doesn’t work in Firefox)

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**Author:** ![noblebaron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e274bd/32.png) [@noblebaron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/noblebaron)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277/3 "2005-10-14T21:48:38Z")

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Thanks Peter. MSN seems to be able to capture only certain sites - unfortunately no preview is available for others (ie, the ones I need!)

🙂

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**Author:** ![alterego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6bbea6/32.png) [@alterego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alterego)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277/4 "2005-10-14T23:25:52Z")

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> [@noblebaron](#):
>
> Thanks Peter. MSN seems to be able to capture only certain sites - unfortunately no preview is available for others (ie, the ones I need!)
> 
> 🙂

[here you are](http://www.pixel-technology.com/freeware/url2bmp/)

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**Author:** ![noblebaron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e274bd/32.png) [@noblebaron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/noblebaron)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2005, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-to-make-thumnail-previews-of-websites/326277/5 "2005-10-15T02:46:53Z")

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Thank you alterego, that should do the trick!!