How to open a .pj8 file (EQ8 project)

What a .pj8 file is

A file ending in .pj8 is an Electric Quilt 8 (EQ8) project. Electric Quilt describes a project as a bag of supplies for one idea: everything you gather is kept in the project’s Sketchbook. That can include quilts, blocks, fabrics, colors, photos, thread and embroidery.

Projects aren’t stored inside the EQ8 program. They’re ordinary files, saved on your computer in a folder called My EQ8. That’s good news: you can find them, copy them and back them up like any other file.

Opening a .pj8 file in EQ8

Electric Quilt lists several ways to open a project. Use whichever you find easiest:

• On the EQ8 Home Screen, click Open an existing project.
• Choose FILE > Open from the menu bar, or press Ctrl+O on Windows or Command+O on a Mac.
• Find the .pj8 file on your computer and double-click it.

If a project was saved somewhere other than your My EQ8 folder, use the Project Helper’s Click here to open a project not listed above and browse to it.

Where EQ8 saves your projects

On Windows

By default, EQ8 saves projects in Documents > My EQ8 > Projects. If you use OneDrive, Windows may have moved your Documents folder into OneDrive, so look in C:\Users\your name\OneDrive\Documents as well.

On a Mac

EQ8 creates the My EQ8 folder in your Home folder. In the Finder, choose Go > Home, then open My EQ8 > Projects. Electric Quilt moved it there from Documents to avoid problems with iCloud Drive, and it asks you not to move or rename the folder, because that can cause issues with EQ8.

Still can’t find one?

Search your computer for files ending in “.PJ8”. Electric Quilt suggests exactly this for lost or missing projects.

Backing up your projects

Backing up the whole My EQ8 folder backs up all of your projects, apart from any you saved somewhere else. Copy it to a USB drive or a cloud service. You don’t need to back up the EQ8 program itself.

1. Close EQ8.
2. Find your My EQ8 folder, using the locations above.
3. Copy the whole folder to your USB drive or cloud storage.
4. Repeat whenever you’ve done a good stretch of designing.

Moving to a new computer? Electric Quilt’s advice is to copy the whole My EQ8 folder to a USB drive, then paste its contents into the My EQ8 folder on the new computer. Install EQ8 on the new computer fresh; don’t try to copy the program across.

Editing a project you love? Use FILE > Save As and give it a new name, so the original stays just as it was.

Sharing a project

With someone who has EQ8

Attach the .pj8 file to an email. Electric Quilt suggests the person receiving it double-clicks the attachment, then uses FILE > Save As to save it into their own My EQ8 > Projects folder. If the file is large, try FILE > Compress Project File Size first. Some email providers won’t send attachments over 10 MB.

EQ8 can open projects from EQ7, but EQ7 can’t open EQ8 projects: the person opening a project needs the same version of EQ or newer. Electric Quilt has also said that EQ projects open whether you’re on a Mac or a PC.

With someone who doesn’t have EQ

Electric Quilt is clear that without EQ, a person won’t be able to open or view the project. So send a picture or a PDF instead:

• A picture: choose FILE > Export Image. EQ8 can save BMP, JPG, GIF, TIFF or PNG images.
• A PDF: EQ8 has no built-in PDF export, so print to a PDF printer. On Windows, choose “Microsoft Print to PDF”. On a Mac, Electric Quilt recommends the free RWTS PDFwriter.

If you don’t have EQ8

If someone has sent you a .pj8 file and you don’t own EQ8, here are your honest options today:

• Ask for a picture or PDF. The sender can export one in a minute, using the steps above.
• Buy EQ8. Electric Quilt sells it for Windows or Mac at $239.95.
• Try another app that imports EQ8. QuiltLab, a browser-based design app, lists “EQ8 import” on its paid Maker plan ($96 a year, billed annually). It doesn’t say which parts of a project come across, so test it with a copy of one file first.

Most other quilt design apps don’t open EQ8 projects. Quiltler, for one, says plainly that it doesn’t. Our comparison of EQ8 alternatives covers the rest.

How Quarter Inch will open them

Quarter Inch is quilt design software for Mac, iPad and the web, and it isn’t released yet. When it is, you’ll be able to choose one .pj8 file, or a whole folder of them, and open them on your Mac, your iPad or in any browser. Projects saved on Mac or Windows will both work.

• Free to open and view. Opening and viewing your EQ8 quilts won’t cost anything.
• A report for every file. A plain-English report will show exactly what came across, and anything, like appliqué, that may need redrawing.
• Your originals stay untouched. Quarter Inch will read the files you’ve saved and never change them.

Want to see it sooner? Before launch, you can send us one EQ8 project and we’ll show you how it comes across. Files are deleted within 30 days. And you don’t have to stop using EQ8. Use both.

Quarter Inch is independent and not affiliated with The Electric Quilt Company.