More: What is a Shapefile? How to View a Shapefileīecause a shapefile is a GIS data file format, a GIS software program is the most common way to load and view this data. All three files must be present in the same directory for them to be viewable. A shapefile is actually a collection of at least three basic files: .shp. Developed by Esri, shapefiles can be directly read by a number of GIS software programs such as ArcGIS and QGIS. Shapefiles stored non-topological vector data along with related attribute data. The shapefile format is now a common format for storing GIS data.
Listed here are shapefile viewers for viewing GIS vector data in shapefile format.
