What image/file formats xyscan can load depends slightly on the platform. By default, xyscan supports the following formats:
| Format | Description |
| BMP | Windows Bitmap |
| GIF | Graphic Interchange Format (optional) |
| JPG | Joint Photographic Experts Group |
| JPEG | Joint Photographic Experts Group |
| PNG | Portable Network Graphics |
| PBM | Portable Bitmap |
| PGM | Portable Graymap |
| PPM | Portable Pixmap |
| XBM | X11 Bitmap |
| XPM | X11 Pixmap |
| TIFF | Tagged Image File Format |
| Portable Document Format |
TIF and PNG files work on most platforms. Starting with version 4, xyscan also supports PDF documents on Linux and macOS.