How to view Trello card attachments without opening a new tab?

[_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス]

Before, when I click on an attachment in a Trello card, a lightbox window appeared. Lately, this has changed, and displayed the attached file is shown in a separate browser tab. 

How can I view the attachments without opening a new tab? 

[Sandy Podborny · Accepted solution]

THANK YOU for reinstating the "view in lightbox" feature for attachments in Trello!!!!! It makes working in client boards and cards SO much more easy! I hope all other Trello users are seeing this features return and are rejoicing!

[Chris Matsumoto]

Amazing! Yes it's back! Convenience has greatly improved and we are loving it. Thank you very much Trello!

[Arbibi]

Yes! Was not a fan of the automatic downloads. We're a video editing company so downloading video wasn't improving our workflow one bit.

Now I just have to find out how to implement "view in lightbox..." I don't see it in cards or settings. Is it available for everyone?

[Sandy Podborny]

I too noticed this change and it's very frustrating. I used to be able to open all my attachments (PDF, jpeg, etc) in the lightbox and scroll through them to see what I needed. Now each one opens a new tab so it's a lot more clicks to see all the attachments.

Something has definitely changed and not for the better. Anyone else having this issue? 

[Владимир Николаевич]

Ура, заработало! Спасибо что исправили!

[Chris Matsumoto]

Though I don't have an answer for this, I was greatly dismayed that neither the preview feature (clicking on the attachment to open within the card) or opening in a new tab (right click "Open in new Tab" or ctrl + left click) does not work anymore.

This is quite aggravating and ruins the whole Trello experience as it is much less convenient.

One use case that we use Trello for is for viewing candidate profiles during our recruitment process. Without the preview feature, there seems to be less advantage in using Trello vs Google drive, or simple email for that matter.

We have been using trello for more than 5 years now, and loved the speed and convenience it brings. However, having this feature removed will greatly affect how we use Trello in our operations.

I hope that Trello is able to request feedback from its users, as I am sure there are plenty of other users that would like this function back.

Here's to hoping that Trello can revert the recent changes made!

[_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス]

To make things worse, last week, we can no longer view the attachments in a new tab: We need to DOWNLOAD them!

[Sandy Podborny]

@_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス @Владимир Николаевич 

There is another tread with the same topic and this is the answer I received on that thread:

I asked around if we have some sort of statement from the Trello team on why these changes happened and was shared this - hope this gives more context and explanation for these changes!

We recently made some changes to how attachments are secured, largely to make sure they’re kept private. Anytime loading an attachment now, checks are made that the person has the board permission to view that attachment, so generally speaking, a good thing. The unintended side effect is that it also made some changes to our preview service, so moving forward, only images and videos will be able to be previewed.

This card from Trello’s Platform team has more details on how this works: https://trello.com/c/tnX5dhiI/87-updated-authenticated-access-to-s3
It may help to upload files via third-party service (i.e. Google Drive) if attachment previews are needed for your use-case.

With all that said, I’ll add this ticket on our feedback board for our product team as right now they’re aware that previews are no longer available mostly because of a technical limitation. I’m not aware of any plans to change this for the moment but I’ll pass the feedback nonetheless!

[_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス]

Thank you for putting this here. This is the mail I received as an answer to my demand. I have to say that this answer is very polite but is simply not satisfying because it has nothing concrete. To make things worse, last week, we can no longer view the attachments in a new tab: We need to DOWNLOAD them!

[Laura Holton _ACE Rotterdam_]

Hi @_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス 👋

Welcome to the Community! Great question if the attachment is an image (png/jpeg) Trello will let you view it in the lightbox window when you click on it. However for any other attachments it immediately opens up in a new tab and usually initiates a download of the attachment. Unfortunately, there is currently no work around to view other attachment types in the lightbox.

I hope this helps but if you have any other questions just ask away 😃

All the best,

Laura

[_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス]

@Laura Holton _ACE Rotterdam_ ok but before, until last month,  I could view even PDF in the lightbox window and that was very helpful. Did something change? 

I still want to view PDF in the lightbox window.

[_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス]

@Laura Holton _ACE Rotterdam_ can you at least confirm that there has been a change ... and not for better

[Владимир Николаевич]

Hello! The same problem with opening pdf files. It appeared this week, before that attachments were viewed in a new tab, now it's only downloading, it's very inconvenient, please return the opening of pdf attachments without downloading, in viewing mode.

[Sandy Podborny]

@_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス  @Владимир Николаевич 

I was wondering if the new downloading requirement was just happening to me or if there had been even more changes so thank you for confirming it is a Trello change, I really thought I had done something wrong with my Google settings lol.

Although nowhere as convenient, I am able to right click the attachment and chose "Open in New Tab" and that seems to by-pass the downloading requirement. Most of my attachments are PDFs so right-clicking opens them up right in Acrobat so I'm still able to not download them. Hope that works for you. 

[Владимир Николаевич]

Thanks for the advice, but it didn't help me, still trying to download pdf..jpeg opens normally.

[Sandy Podborny]

@Владимир Николаевич @_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス @Chris Matsumoto

Looks like they have reinstating the "view in lightbox" feature for attachments in Trello!!!!! Hope you are seeing this change as well.

[_Sami Ben Fradj_受講者オフィス]

Yes! now it looks good. Happy that they brought back the lightbox feature. 

Thanks for the comments and good luck with your job everyone ;)