Download Pinterest videos and GIFs

Pinterest is built around browsing, not keeping — a pin you like today can be buried under a hundred new ones by next week, and there's no obvious way to save the actual file rather than just bookmarking it inside the app. Whether it's a video, an animated GIF, or a still image, here's how to keep a real copy.

Step 1: Open the pin and copy its link

Tap the pin to open it fully, then tap the Share icon and choose Copy link. You'll get either a full pinterest.com/pin/... URL or a shortened pin.it/... link depending on where you copied it from — both formats work the same way with the downloader.

Step 2: Paste it into the downloader

Go to the Pinterest downloader, paste the link, and press Download. The tool automatically detects whether the pin is a video, a GIF, or a static image and returns the matching file type.

Step 3: Save the file

Once the result appears, save it the same way you'd save any file on your device — tap and hold on mobile to save to Photos, or right-click and Save As on desktop if it doesn't download automatically.

What resolution do you actually get

The download returns the largest version of the file that Pinterest has stored, which is usually — but not always — the same as what the original poster uploaded. A lot of pins are reposted from other sites, and Pinterest sometimes stores a smaller cached copy rather than the source image at full size, so very occasionally the result is smaller than you'd expect from how it displays on the grid.

Multi-image Idea Pins

Idea Pins can bundle several photos or video clips into one swipeable post. Pasting the link here lists each image or video separately, so you can pick exactly which ones to keep instead of being forced to download the whole set.

Board links and profile links don't work

This tool needs the link to one specific pin — a link to an entire board, or to someone's profile, won't return anything, since there's no single file to fetch from those pages. If you want to save several pins from the same board, each one needs to be opened and copied individually.

Where a lot of Pinterest content actually comes from

Much of what circulates on Pinterest was originally posted somewhere else — a blog, a shop, another social platform — and simply reposted by whoever pinned it. Before reusing an image or video publicly, it's worth a quick search to trace the original source and credit the actual creator, rather than assuming the person who pinned it made it.

Saving without a Pinterest account

No login is required at any point — the tool only reads the public pin link you provide. This matters because Pinterest itself sometimes nudges browsers into creating an account just to view a pin at full size; the direct link bypasses that entirely.

Video pins versus static image pins

The downloader automatically figures out which type of content a pin contains — there's no separate mode to switch between for video, GIF or static images, you just paste the link and get back whatever format matches what's actually stored there.

Shopping and product pins

Product pins with video work the same as any other pin, though it's worth remembering that a lot of shopping content is pre-made marketing footage rather than something the poster filmed themselves — check your right to reuse it beyond personal reference before doing anything more with it.

Saving pins from a computer

The same process works from a desktop browser: open the pin on pinterest.com, use the share icon to copy its link, and paste it into the downloader exactly as on mobile. Some people find this faster than typing on a phone when saving several pins in one sitting.

What if the same pin appears on multiple boards

A single pin can be saved to many boards by different users, but they all point back to the same underlying content — it doesn't matter which board version you copy the link from, the download result will be identical either way.

One more thing worth knowing

A pin uploaded only moments ago may not be fully processed on Pinterest's side yet — if a very fresh pin fails to download, waiting a minute before trying the same link again usually resolves it.

Pinterest also occasionally re-encodes uploaded GIFs into video format behind the scenes for smoother playback in the app — if a "GIF" downloads as an MP4 instead of a looping .gif file, that's why, and the visual content is identical either way.

If you regularly save inspiration for a project — a wedding, a renovation, an outfit board — organizing downloaded files into folders by topic as you go makes them far easier to find again later than leaving everything mixed together in one Downloads folder.