How can GIMP save older version of xcf file format

Question

GIMP's native file format has evolved during the years. If there is an external tool that is capable to read *.xcf files then it still can happen that the tool cannot read the file, complaining about unknown file format, or something like this:

read XCF: unsupported file version: v011

How can I save the image into the older version of the *.xcf format?

Answer 1

GIMP is smart enough and alerts you when you save the file.

This alert is displayed when your image contains something that GIMP cannot save into the old format, therefore the new version is needed. If you want to save the old format then you need to remove everything from your image that is too modern and impossible to store in an older format of *.xcf.

GIMP also tells what feature in the image is/are exactly the one/ones that make GIMP to use the newer version.

In the above picture, you can see that the layer mode setting is not compatible with the old format, therefore GIMP will use the new one.

In order to get rid of this message, you need to change the layer mode by right-clicking each layer, and change them in the Edit Layer Attributes -> Mode drop-down from Normal to Normal (l) or similar. The drop-down shows only the Default layer modes by default but if you click the little icon on the right side of the drop-down then you can switch to the Legacy layer modes.

If you try to save the *.xcf again then the above message disappears and the older version of *.xcf format will be used.

Maybe you still have some other settings in your image that are not compatible with the old file format. You need to hunt them down one-by-one but sooner or later you will be able to save in the older format.