diff --git a/file_entity.install b/file_entity.install
index a1f86c2..d84aa02 100644
--- a/file_entity.install
+++ b/file_entity.install
@@ -225,6 +225,20 @@ function file_entity_install() {
   if (module_exists('pathauto')) {
     variable_set('pathauto_file_pattern', 'file/[file:name]');
   }
+
+  // Classify existing files according to the currently defined file types.
+  // Queue all files to be classified during cron runs using the Queue API.
+  $queue = DrupalQueue::get('file_entity_type_determine');
+
+  $result = db_query('SELECT fid FROM {file_managed}');
+
+  foreach ($result as $record) {
+    $queue->createItem($record->fid);
+  }
+
+  // Warn users that existing files will not have a file type until the queue
+  // has been processed.
+  drupal_set_message(t('Existing files must be classified according to the currently defined file types. These files have been queued for processing and will have their file type determined during cron runs.'));
 }
 
 /**
diff --git a/file_entity.module b/file_entity.module
index afeb63b..2d11e3b 100644
--- a/file_entity.module
+++ b/file_entity.module
@@ -426,6 +426,29 @@ function file_entity_permission() {
   return $permissions;
 }
 
+/*
+ * Implements hook_cron_queue_info().
+ */
+function file_entity_cron_queue_info() {
+  $queues['file_entity_type_determine'] = array(
+    'worker callback' => 'file_entity_type_determine',
+  );
+  return $queues;
+}
+
+/*
+ * Determines file type for a given file ID and saves the file.
+ *
+ * @param $fid
+ *   A file ID.
+ */
+function file_entity_type_determine($fid) {
+  $file = file_load($fid);
+
+  // The file type will be automatically determined when saving the file.
+  file_save($file);
+}
+
 /**
  * Gather the rankings from the the hook_ranking implementations.
  *
diff --git a/tests/file_entity.test b/tests/file_entity.test
index 2435075..63854a1 100644
--- a/tests/file_entity.test
+++ b/tests/file_entity.test
@@ -183,6 +183,73 @@ class FileEntityTestHelper extends DrupalWebTestCase {
   }
 }
 
+class FileEntityFileTypeClassificationTestCase extends DrupalWebTestCase {
+  public static function getInfo() {
+    return array(
+      'name' => 'File entity classification',
+      'description' => 'Test existing file entity classification functionality.',
+      'group' => 'File entity',
+    );
+  }
+
+  function setUp() {
+    parent::setUp();
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * Get the file type of a given file.
+   *
+   * @param $file
+   *   A file object.
+   *
+   * @return
+   *   The file's file type as a string.
+   */
+  function getFileType($file) {
+    $type = db_select('file_managed', 'fm')
+      ->fields('fm', array('type'))
+      ->condition('fid', $file->fid, '=')
+      ->execute()
+      ->fetchAssoc();
+
+    return $type;
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * Test that existing files are properly classified by file type.
+   */
+  function testFileTypeClassification() {
+    // Get test text and image files.
+    $file = current($this->drupalGetTestFiles('text'));
+    $text_file = file_save($file);
+    $file = current($this->drupalGetTestFiles('image'));
+    $image_file = file_save($file);
+
+    // Enable file entity which adds adds a file type property to files and
+    // queues up existing files for classification.
+    module_enable(array('file_entity'));
+
+    // Existing files have yet to be classified and should have an undefined
+    // file type.
+    $file_type = $this->getFileType($text_file);
+    $this->assertEqual($file_type['type'], 'undefined', t('The text file has an undefined file type.'));
+    $file_type = $this->getFileType($image_file);
+    $this->assertEqual($file_type['type'], 'undefined', t('The image file has an undefined file type.'));
+
+    // The classification queue is processed during cron runs. Run cron to
+    // trigger the classification process.
+    $this->cronRun();
+
+    // The classification process should assign a file type to any file whose
+    // MIME type is assigned to a file type. Check to see if each file was
+    // assigned a proper file type.
+    $file_type = $this->getFileType($text_file);
+    $this->assertEqual($file_type['type'], 'document', t('The text file was properly assigned the Document file type.'));
+    $file_type = $this->getFileType($image_file);
+    $this->assertEqual($file_type['type'], 'image', t('The image file was properly assigned the Image file type.'));
+  }
+}
+
 class FileEntityUnitTestCase extends FileEntityTestHelper {
   public static function getInfo() {
     return array(