Why won't animated GIFs stay animated after I save them to photos?

I used to save animated photos or GIF to my photos, and I could click on them anytime and they would play no issues at all. Within the last few months or so now when I save GIFs from any internet page, they are frozen in my photos and do not play anymore. I'm not talking about using preview I'm simply referring to clicking 'add image to photos' on my Macbook Air. I have Big Sur 11.2.3 if that matters.


Thanks for any help or recommendations.

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 11.2

Posted on Apr 15, 2021 6:56 PM

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Posted on Apr 17, 2021 4:52 AM

Do you have iCloud Photos enabled? Then animated gifs may need downloading from iCloud, before they will play.


You may want to check, if the file you saved to Photos is really the animated gif or just the thumbnail of the animated gif.

Export one of your saved gifs from Photos with "File > export > Export unmodified original". When you view this file in the Finder in gallery view, it should be animated and have the filename extension "gif". If the exported original is not a GIF, you need to view the GIF in your web browser in a separate window, so you can save the linked file to Photos and not just the still thumbnail.


Photos 6 on Big Sur is showing animated GIFs as animated in any album and in All Photos, when you view them enlarged, but not in slideshows.


2 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Apr 17, 2021 4:52 AM in response to Brian1224

Do you have iCloud Photos enabled? Then animated gifs may need downloading from iCloud, before they will play.


You may want to check, if the file you saved to Photos is really the animated gif or just the thumbnail of the animated gif.

Export one of your saved gifs from Photos with "File > export > Export unmodified original". When you view this file in the Finder in gallery view, it should be animated and have the filename extension "gif". If the exported original is not a GIF, you need to view the GIF in your web browser in a separate window, so you can save the linked file to Photos and not just the still thumbnail.


Photos 6 on Big Sur is showing animated GIFs as animated in any album and in All Photos, when you view them enlarged, but not in slideshows.


Apr 16, 2021 11:33 AM in response to Brian1224

As a test launch Photos with the Option key held down and create a new, test library.  Import some photos and test to see if the same problem persists. Does it? This tells us if the problem is limited to your current library or is more wide spread.


Next, log into another vanilla admin user account, Set up users, guests, and groups on Mac and see if the problem persists. This tells us if the problem is limited to your user account or is system wide.


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Why won't animated GIFs stay animated after I save them to photos?

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