Saving Telegram stickers and GIFs

The formats, which explain most of the confusion

A Telegram “GIF” is an MP4 video with no audio track. Telegram converts uploaded GIFs on arrival because MP4 is dramatically smaller and smoother. Saving one gives you an MP4, and no setting changes that.

A static sticker is a WebP image. An animated sticker is a TGS file, which is a gzipped Lottie JSON animation — not a video at all, and not openable by ordinary image software. A video sticker is WebM.

This is why “save Telegram sticker as PNG” has no direct answer: the source is not a PNG and converting means rendering it.

Saving them

On Telegram Web or Desktop, right-click the sticker or GIF and choose Save As. You get the file in its native format, unmodified.

On mobile, tap and hold a GIF to add it to your saved GIFs panel, which keeps it inside Telegram rather than putting a file on your device. Getting the file itself out is easier from the desktop or web app.

For a whole sticker pack rather than one sticker, Telegram’s @Stickers bot and various pack-export bots can produce archives; treat any bot asking for a login code with the same suspicion as any other.

Converting them to something usable

MP4 to an actual animated GIF is a straightforward conversion with ffmpeg or any online converter, at the cost of a much larger file and fewer colours. Worth doing only when the destination genuinely requires GIF.

TGS animated stickers need a Lottie renderer. Several converters output GIF or WebM; expect some fidelity loss because you are rasterising a vector animation.

WebP is widely supported now, but if something rejects it, any image editor will export a PNG.

Why does Telegram save GIFs as MP4?

Because Telegram stores them as silent MP4 videos rather than as GIF files — the conversion happens on upload, since MP4 is far smaller and plays more smoothly. There is no setting to get the original GIF back.

How do I save a Telegram sticker as an image?

Right-click it in Telegram Web or Desktop and choose Save As. Static stickers save as WebP, which most modern software opens; animated ones save as TGS, a Lottie animation that needs a converter to become an image or video.

Can I download a whole Telegram sticker pack?

Yes, via pack-export bots, or by saving each sticker individually from Telegram Desktop. Be cautious with any bot that requests your phone number or login code — that authorises a full account session and is never needed to fetch public stickers.