diff --git a/docs/configuration.rst b/docs/configuration.rst
index 304ddb4f93..a56fa42cd8 100644
--- a/docs/configuration.rst
+++ b/docs/configuration.rst
@@ -337,6 +337,23 @@ Description
       filename extension (``file.1.ext``, ``file.2.ext``, etc.)
 
 
+extractor.*.skip-extension
+-----------------
+Type
+    * ``bool``
+Default
+    ``false``
+Description
+    If enabled, the file extension is ignored when checking to see if a file
+    already exists locally during the pre-download stage.
+    i.e. if downloading `./test/image_5.jpg` but `./test/image_5.png` or
+    `./test/image_5.avif` exists, it will behave as if `./test/image_5.jpg` exists
+    on disk
+
+    * ``false``: Respects the file extension when checking if the file exists
+    * ``true``: Ignores the file extension when checking if the file exists and 
+    any file with the same path & name will return True
+
 extractor.*.sleep
 -----------------
 Type
diff --git a/docs/gallery-dl.conf b/docs/gallery-dl.conf
index 9f126524e3..12d16ca1da 100644
--- a/docs/gallery-dl.conf
+++ b/docs/gallery-dl.conf
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@
         "cookies-update": true,
         "proxy": null,
         "skip": true,
+        "skip-extension": false,
 
         "user-agent": "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:109.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/115.0",
         "retries": 4,
diff --git a/gallery_dl/path.py b/gallery_dl/path.py
index 71927a55bb..d45d579820 100644
--- a/gallery_dl/path.py
+++ b/gallery_dl/path.py
@@ -12,6 +12,7 @@
 import re
 import shutil
 import functools
+import glob
 from . import util, formatter, exception
 
 WINDOWS = util.WINDOWS
@@ -51,6 +52,7 @@ def __init__(self, extractor):
             raise exception.FilenameFormatError(exc)
 
         directory_fmt = config("directory")
+        self.skip_ext = config("skip-extension") or False
         try:
             if directory_fmt is None:
                 directory_fmt = extractor.directory_fmt
@@ -158,8 +160,17 @@ def open(self, mode="wb"):
 
     def exists(self):
         """Return True if the file exists on disk"""
-        if self.extension and os.path.exists(self.realpath):
-            return self.check_file()
+        # Search only by file name not including file extension
+        # This means checking if 'image_1.jpg' is on disk will
+        # be True if 'image_1.png' is found
+        if self.skip_ext:
+            split_real_path = self.realpath.split(".")
+            any_ext_path = ".".join(split_real_path[:-1]) + ".*"
+            if self.extension and glob.glob(any_ext_path):
+                return self.check_file()
+        else:
+            if self.extension and os.path.exists(self.realpath):
+                return self.check_file()
         return False
 
     @staticmethod