PintSave — Guide

How to Download Pinterest GIFs Without Losing the Animation

You save a Pinterest GIF, open the file, and it's frozen on a single frame. The motion you saved it for is gone.

This happens because most download methods grab whatever is currently rendered on your screen, which is often a static preview rather than the moving file underneath it.

Here's how to download the pin so the animation stays intact.

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Why the Animation Gets Lost

Pinterest often shows a still frame in feeds and search results to save loading time, then plays the animation once you open the pin's detail view. A basic right-click or screenshot only captures that still frame.

Some animated pins are also stored as short video files rather than traditional GIF files. Pinterest's own Pin spec guide lists JPEG, PNG, BMP, TIFF, and WEBP as its accepted image formats, with GIF notably absent, which is why a dedicated tool matters more here than with a regular photo pin.

01 Open the Animated Pin

Find the pin and open its full detail page on Pinterest. Confirm the animation is actually playing before you continue.

02 Copy the Direct Pin Link

Tap the share icon and select Copy Link. This gives you the URL for that specific pin, not a board or feed link.

03 Paste the Link Into the Downloader

Go to our Pinterest GIF Downloader and paste the link into the input box. The tool detects whether Pinterest stored the pin as a GIF or a short video and pulls the full animated file, not the static preview.

04 Download and Confirm It Plays

Tap download, then open the saved file to confirm the animation plays from start to finish. If it opens frozen, the pin itself may only have a single available frame stored on Pinterest's servers.

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