Updated: Snes9xgx Cover Art

The Ultimate Guide to SNES9xGX Cover Art: Beautify Your Retro Library

If you are a fan of classic Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) games, you have likely encountered SNES9xGX. As one of the most polished and user-friendly emulators available for the Nintendo Wii, GameCube, and other homebrew platforms, it offers an almost flawless way to replay classics like Super Metroid, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, and Chrono Trigger.

However, there is a stark difference between browsing a plain list of ROM filenames (e.g., chrono_trigger.sfc) and scrolling through a vibrant, art-filled library. That difference is SNES9xGX cover art. snes9xgx cover art

In this long-form guide, we will explore everything you need to know about adding cover art to SNES9xGX: why it matters, how to source the art, how to name your files correctly, and step-by-step instructions for installation. The Ultimate Guide to SNES9xGX Cover Art: Beautify

"The images look pixelated or distorted."

  • This usually happens if the source image was stretched. SNES boxes were not perfectly square; they were slightly taller than they were wide. Ensure you are not forcing a square image (1:1 ratio) onto a rectangular box art aspect ratio.

"The emulator crashes when I scroll through covers."

  • This is a memory issue. You likely have too many high-resolution images loaded at once. Re-size your images to be smaller (under 200px width) to reduce the RAM load on the Wii.

1. Where cover art goes

  • On your SD/USB:
    /snes9xgx/roms/ (where your ROMs are)
    Create a subfolder: covers
    Example: /snes9xgx/roms/covers/

Technical Requirements: Formats and Dimensions

To successfully display cover art, snes9xgx has specific technical requirements. Using the wrong format will result in a blank screen or a corrupted image icon. This usually happens if the source image was stretched

Supported File Formats

  • PNG: This is the highly recommended format. It offers lossless compression and supports transparency, which is useful if you want the images to blend smoothly with the emulator's background themes.
  • JPG/JPEG: Supported, but generally discouraged for this specific use case due to compression artifacts that can look muddy on lower-resolution CRT or Wii-output screens.

Method 1: The Manual Method (Best for small libraries)

  1. Prepare the Folder: Navigate to your SD card or USB drive. Locate the snes9xgx folder (usually in apps/snes9xgx). Inside, look for a folder named covers. If it does not exist, create it.
  2. Acquire Images: Search online for "SNES Box Art" or "SNES Covers." Download the front cover of the game box.
  3. Resize: Open the image in an editor (Paint, Photoshop, GIMP) and resize it to a reasonable width (e.g., 150px–200px wide, maintaining aspect ratio).
  4. Rename: Rename the image file to match your ROM file exactly.
    • ROM: Legend of Zelda, The - A Link to the Past (USA).smc
    • Art: Legend of Zelda, The - A Link to the Past (USA).png
  5. Transfer: Move the PNG file into the covers folder.
  6. Activate: Launch snes9xgx. Go to Settings > Menu > View Mode and change it from "List" to "Icons" or "Covers."

Where to Find High-Quality SNES9xGX Cover Art

Since SNES9xGX does not scrape automatically, you need to manually download cover sets. Here are the best sources: