diff --git a/src/ai/insight_generator.rs b/src/ai/insight_generator.rs
index df18fd4..d43f5f1 100644
--- a/src/ai/insight_generator.rs
+++ b/src/ai/insight_generator.rs
@@ -463,7 +463,7 @@ impl InsightGenerator {
         log::debug!("Loading image for vision model: {:?}", full_path);
 
         // Open and decode the image
-        let img = image::open(&full_path)
+        let img = crate::file_types::open_image(&full_path)
             .map_err(|e| anyhow::anyhow!("Failed to open image file: {}", e))?;
 
         let (original_width, original_height) = (img.width(), img.height());
diff --git a/src/faces.rs b/src/faces.rs
index 645bb1c..edbb201 100644
--- a/src/faces.rs
+++ b/src/faces.rs
@@ -2179,7 +2179,7 @@ async fn person_faces_handler<D: FaceDao>(
 // ── Helpers ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
 
 /// Crop `abs_path` to the normalized bbox and re-encode as JPEG for the
-/// face service. `image::open` decodes most photo formats Apollo will see;
+/// face service. `open_image` decodes most photo formats Apollo will see;
 /// HEIC/RAW are out of scope for the manual flow (the user can't draw a
 /// face on a thumbnail of a non-decodable file anyway).
 fn crop_image_to_bbox(
@@ -2195,7 +2195,8 @@ fn crop_image_to_bbox(
     if nw <= 0.0 || nh <= 0.0 || nx + nw > 1.001 || ny + nh > 1.001 {
         return Err(anyhow!("bbox wh out of bounds or zero"));
     }
-    let raw = image::open(abs_path).with_context(|| format!("open {:?}", abs_path))?;
+    let raw =
+        crate::file_types::open_image(abs_path).with_context(|| format!("open {:?}", abs_path))?;
     // EXIF rotation: the bbox arrives in display space (the carousel /
     // overlay are rendered post-rotation by the browser), but the
     // `image` crate hands us raw pre-rotation pixels. For any phone
diff --git a/src/file_types.rs b/src/file_types.rs
index b834cba..ac7d856 100644
--- a/src/file_types.rs
+++ b/src/file_types.rs
@@ -115,6 +115,16 @@ pub fn direntry_is_media(entry: &DirEntry) -> bool {
     is_media_file(entry.path())
 }
 
+/// Decode an image by its bytes, not its extension. `image::open` picks
+/// the decoder from the extension, so a PNG saved as `.jpg` (Android
+/// screenshots, chat exports) fails with "Illegal start bytes: 8950".
+/// Sniffing falls back to the extension when the header is unknown.
+pub fn open_image(path: &Path) -> image::ImageResult<image::DynamicImage> {
+    image::ImageReader::open(path)?
+        .with_guessed_format()?
+        .decode()
+}
+
 #[cfg(test)]
 mod tests {
     use super::*;
@@ -190,4 +200,16 @@ mod tests {
         assert!(is_image_file(Path::new(".cover.jpg")));
         assert!(!is_filesystem_metadata(Path::new(".cover.jpg")));
     }
+
+    #[test]
+    fn open_image_sniffs_format_over_extension() {
+        let dir = tempfile::tempdir().unwrap();
+        let path = dir.path().join("Screenshot_2014-11-17-21-30-31.jpg");
+        image::RgbImage::new(3, 2)
+            .save_with_format(&path, image::ImageFormat::Png)
+            .unwrap();
+        assert!(image::open(&path).is_err(), "extension-based decode fails");
+        let img = open_image(&path).unwrap();
+        assert_eq!((img.width(), img.height()), (3, 2));
+    }
 }
diff --git a/src/perceptual_hash.rs b/src/perceptual_hash.rs
index 619bfa5..0799efe 100644
--- a/src/perceptual_hash.rs
+++ b/src/perceptual_hash.rs
@@ -30,7 +30,7 @@ pub struct PerceptualIdentity {
 /// callers should treat that as "no perceptual signal available" and
 /// proceed with exact-match dedup only.
 pub fn compute(path: &Path) -> Option<PerceptualIdentity> {
-    let img = image::open(path).ok()?;
+    let img = crate::file_types::open_image(path).ok()?;
 
     // 8x8 = 64 bits, the standard size for pHash/dHash. Larger sizes
     // give more discriminative power but no longer fit in i64 and the
diff --git a/src/thumbnails.rs b/src/thumbnails.rs
index 507c2b1..dcec895 100644
--- a/src/thumbnails.rs
+++ b/src/thumbnails.rs
@@ -104,7 +104,7 @@ pub fn generate_image_thumbnail(src: &Path, thumb_path: &Path) -> std::io::Resul
         return generate_image_thumbnail_ffmpeg(src, thumb_path, orientation);
     }
 
-    let img = image::open(src).map_err(|e| {
+    let img = file_types::open_image(src).map_err(|e| {
         std::io::Error::new(std::io::ErrorKind::InvalidData, format!("{:?}: {}", src, e))
     })?;
     let img = exif::apply_orientation(img, orientation);
@@ -148,7 +148,7 @@ pub fn generate_preview(src: &Path, dest: &Path, max_dim: u32) -> std::io::Resul
         return generate_preview_ffmpeg(src, dest, orientation, max_dim);
     }
 
-    let img = image::open(src).map_err(|e| {
+    let img = file_types::open_image(src).map_err(|e| {
         std::io::Error::new(std::io::ErrorKind::InvalidData, format!("{:?}: {}", src, e))
     })?;
     let img = exif::apply_orientation(img, orientation);