How To Make a GIF in Photoshop

A GIF or Graphics Interchange Format is a digital image format that accepts animation. You’ll find them being used for memes and small length videos made from still images.

Our article will show you how to make a GIF in Photoshop.

What Is a GIF?

A GIF is a digital image that supports animated images. No doubt, you have seen memes that move. They are GIFs. A small number of images can be placed together to create a gif, which gives you the impression of watching a video rather than a static image.

This Graphics Interchange Format is a bitmap image that is a lossless file and can be seen all over the internet.

Common Questions

How Do I Save a Photoshop File as a GIF?

To save a file as a GIF, you need to import your files onto the timeline window, and then export them using the Save for Web export.

A GIF is a moving image, so unless you have more than one image to export, there is no reason to do so.

Can I Edit GIFs in Photoshop?

You can open and edit images in Photoshop. Locate and open the GIF as you would with any other image file. From here, you are free to edit as you wish.

If you use the Save for Web option, you can preview the GIF before exporting it.

How Do I Open the Timeline in Photoshop?

To open the Timeline window in Photoshop, you need to go to Window>Timeline. It will appear at the bottom of the Photoshop work area.

How Can I Make a GIF?

After capturing a series of images, they need to be stitched together. This is what turns your still images into a moving video.

The first thing you’ll need to do is add images to Photoshop. Open up the program, and then head over to File>Scripts>Load Files into Stack.

To import the files, go to Browse, locate your images, and then click OK.

Once the images are loaded in as layers, you’ll need to open the Timeline area of Photoshop.

When the timeline area opens up, you’ll see Create Video Timeline at the bottom. Click on the arrow next to it to open up the other option, namely Create Frame Animation.

Clicking on this will open your layer as a frame at the bottom. To add the other layers as frames, go to Select>All Layers.

Once selected, click on the button that looks like three lines in the top right-hand corner of the timeline section. Once the menu opens, select Create New Layer for Each New Frame.

(NB: This didn’t work for me, so instead I clicked on Make Frames From Layers)

All the layers will be added as frames in the timeline section. Under each one will be a time in seconds. They should start at 0 Seconds. Click on the down arrow to change the length.

For my project, I went with 0.5 seconds. At 11 frames, this gives me a GIF of 5.5 seconds.

At the bottom of the timeline section, you can change how often the GIF loops. The given options are Once, Three Times, or Forever. I kept my project on Forever.

To preview the GIF, press the Play button.

If you are happy with what you have created, you need to Export the GIF. You’ll find this in File>Export. Once here, go to Save for Web (Legacy).

When the window opens, the Save for Web (100%) box will give you a lot of options. There are only a few you need.

Go to the Preset box, and change it to GIF 128 Dithered.

Click on Save.

Then click on Save again in the finder window.

…and you should have something like this! Enjoy!