What Is a GIF?
A file with the GIF file extension is a Graphical Interchange Format file. GIFs (pronounced ‘gif’ or ‘jiff’) are typically small image files that most people use to create animated images to share on social media. However, a GIF can be used with large files as well.
How to Use Gifs
Although GIFs don’t contain audio data, they’re often seen online as a way to share video clips. Websites often use them, too, to display animated objects like buttons or header images. Because they’re saved in a lossless format, image quality isn’t degraded when used with GIF compression.
How to Open a GIF File
On almost all operating systems, most web browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, etc.) open online GIFs with no problem—you don’t need any other program on your computer. Open local GIFs with the Open menu, or possibly with a drag-and-drop into the browser window. However, with other applications like Photoshop, while the software can technically open the GIF like it can with other graphics, it doesn’t really display the GIF as you’d expect it to. Instead, it opens each frame of the file as a separate layer. While this is great for editing the GIF, it’s not so great for playing/viewing it with ease like in a web browser. Next to a basic web browser, the default graphics viewer in Windows, called Photos, is probably the easiest way to open them in that OS. Some other programs for Windows that can open GIF files are Adobe’s Photoshop Elements and Illustrator programs, CorelDRAW, Corel PaintShop Pro, and Canvas. If you’re using macOS, Apple Preview, Safari, and the Adobe programs mentioned above can work with GIF files. On Linux, use GIMP, while iOS and Android devices (and any desktop OS) can view GIF files in Google Drive. Some mobile devices open GIFs in their respective default photo applications. It might depend on how old your device is or if the software is up-to-date, but most of them can download and display GIF files without having you install any extra apps.
How to Convert a GIF File
Converting a GIF file to a different file format is easiest if you use an online file converter. That way, you don’t have to download a program just to convert a couple GIFs. FileZigZag is a wonderful website that converts the GIF to image formats like JPG, PNG, TGA, TIFF, and BMP, but also to video file formats like MP4, MOV, AVI, and 3GP. Another online GIF converter like that one is Zamzar. The GIF viewers mentioned above might be some other options for saving the file to a different format. Most of those programs are image editors, so chances are you can actually use them to edit the GIF as well as save it to a video or image file format. Most converters can do the opposite, too, and convert an image or video to the GIF format.
How to Create GIFs and Download Free GIFs
To make your own GIF from a video, use free online GIF-making tools. For example, Imgur makes GIFs from online videos by letting you choose which section of the video should be a GIF. It even lets you overlay text. In addition to Imgur, GIPHY is one of the best places to find popular and new GIFs that you can then download or easily share on other websites. You can share the GIF to Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and several other places, plus download it for yourself and email the GIF. GIPHY also publishes a link to the HTML5 version of each of their GIFs. As we mentioned above, Photoshop is another example of a program that can convert a series of images into a GIF file; our How to Make a GIF in Photoshop guide provides all the details. See our GIMP animated GIF tutorial if you’d rather use that free program. The Workflow automation app available on iPhones and iPads is another easy way to create GIFs from your own photos and videos. We also have this list of GIF maker apps for your phone (including Android).
More Information on GIF Files
Parts of a GIF file can be transparent to reveal the background behind the picture. Since GIF files are usually limited in the number of colors they can display (just 256), other graphic formats like JPG, which can store many millions of colors, work best for full images like those created with a digital camera. GIF files, then, are used on websites when there doesn’t need to be a massive range of colors, like for buttons or banners. GIFs can actually store more than 256 colors, but it involves a process that results in the file being much larger than it needs to be—something that can be accomplished by JPG without affecting the size as much.
Some History on the GIF Format
The original GIF format was called GIF 87a and was published by CompuServe in 1987. A couple years later, the company updated the format and named it GIF 98a. It was the second iteration that included support for transparent backgrounds and the storing of metadata. While both versions of the GIF format allow for animations, it was 98a that included delayed animation support.
