If you want to save high-res thumbnails from videos you love to your devices, you need a top-notch thumbnail grabber.
Saving YouTube thumbnails locally has many upsides. You’ll always be able to find them again, no matter if a YouTube creator decides to change a video’s thumbnail, or to delete the whole thing. Compared to grabbing an entire video, downloading the thumbnail also takes far less storage space on your devices.
Plus, if you ever need inspiration for your own video thumbnails, you’ll have an entire gallery right there.
That said, what are the best YouTube thumbnail grabbers out there? We’ve rounded them up for you!
Quick Facts
- YouTube thumbnail grabbers let you save JPG or PNG versions of video thumbnails to your device.
- Some of the best are Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com, ImageYouTube.com, YouTube Thumbnail Viewer, vidIQ’s Vision, and 50015.io.
- Using thumbnail grabbers is technically against YouTube’s terms of service. However, as long as you strictly keep them for personal use, it’s not illegal.
Keep reading for the full scoop!
Contents
Are YouTube Thumbnail Grabbers Legal?
Before we dive into our list of the best YouTube thumbnail grabbers, let’s quickly discuss legality.
While YouTube thumbnail grabbers are not illegal, strictly speaking, they are against YouTube’s terms of service. However, in practice, that rule does not seem to be enforced.
Overall, as long as you save other creators’ thumbnails for strictly personal use, you’re fine. That includes using them as inspiration or for researching your design strategy. To use the thumbnail in your own content, you should get permission.
Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com
Topping our list of the best YouTube thumbnail grabbers is Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com.
This online tool works in the simplest way possible. You go to the site and copy-paste the target video’s URL. And voilà, there’s the thumbnail. You can then save it to your device as a JPG through a simple right-click (desktop) or tap-and-hold (mobile).
Plus, it automatically gives you the thumbnail in two resolutions: in HD, and in the maximum available resolution.
However, there are two caveats. First, it’s ad-supported. That means you need a solid ad-blocker if you want to avoid being spammed.
Second, Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com does not automatically work with YouTube Shorts thumbnails. However, there is a workaround: You can take the Shorts URL (e.g., youtube.com/shorts/bQ0wAYkMd8c) and simply delete the “/shorts/” part of the URL (like so: youtube.com/bQ0wAYkMd8c). Using this shorter version gets you the Shorts thumbnail, though expanded to a horizontal format.
ImageYouTube.com Thumbnail Downloader
Next up on our list of the best YouTube thumbnail grabbers is the ImageYouTube.com Thumbnail Downloader. Like Get-YouTube-Thumbnail, this is a web tool that works in a fairly straightforward fashion. You drop the URL, click the button, and you’re good to go.
The big difference is that ImageYouTube gives you more than just the thumbnail ready-to-download. It also provides you with a lot of information about each video, starting with some video stats, followed by the video watermark, then the thumbnail in a variety of sizes. It also gives you the start, middle, and end frame of the video, then a lot of channel information. For good measure, it throws in the channel’s profile picture and banner.
Plus, ImageYouTube.com can also download Shorts thumbnails without any issues.
However, there are a few downsides to this tool. The web design, for one, is truly awful, and that’s not even considering the staggering amount of ads. It’s all a bit much if you just want to save a thumbnail real quick.
YouTube Thumbnail Viewer
Next up is YouTube Thumbnail Viewer, one of several Chrome extensions out there that help you save thumbnails locally.
Unlike its competitors, though, YouTube Thumbnail viewer works consistently and is the most intuitive. Rather than making you hunt for a toolbar button menu or use a context menu, it displays a tiny thumbnail right next to the title on a video’s page.
Simply click that icon to open the thumbnail in maximum resolution, which you can then save.
If you save thumbnails regularly and are happy with the default resolution, this extension is a great pick. Note that it won’t work on Shorts!
vidIQ Vision for YouTube
Another useful browser extension – even though it’s not a dedicated YouTube thumbnail grabber – is vidIQ Vision for YouTube.
In fact, vidIQ Vision can be a handy multi-tool in any creator’s arsenal. To begin with, it gives you crucial intelligence on any regular video on YouTube – including how many views it gets per hour.
To download a thumbnail using vidIQ Vision, you just open the video, then click “view full thumbnail” in the info sidebar, then save that.
However, before you can get started with vidIQ Vision, you need to create an account. The good news? Basic functionalities are free, and that includes the thumbnail viewer.
It’s only when you want to use vidIQ’s more advanced tools that you need to start paying a monthly subscription. Note that this one, too, doesn’t work on Shorts.
50015.io YouTube Thumbnail Grabber
Rounding out our list of the best YouTube thumbnail grabbers is the 50015.io YouTube Thumbnail Grabber.
This free online tool boasts a nice, clean design and relatively few ads. Plus, the site actually offers numerous other handy utilities, like a Vimeo thumbnail grabber.
As with other web tools on this list, just paste the video URL to immediately access an HQ version of its thumbnail. Like ImageYouTube.com, it also gives you the thumbnail in a variety of resolutions.
Its one downside? Like Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com, it can’t handle Shorts URLs as such. You can, however, replace the “/shorts/” bit with “/embed/”: Using the same example as above, change youtube.com/shorts/bQ0wAYkMd8c to youtube.com/embed/bQ0wAYkMd8c, and it’ll work.
FAQs
A YouTube thumbnail grabber lets you save YouTube thumbnails as images on your device.
The best thumbnail grabber overall is Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com.
Yes, you can. You need to use a YouTube thumbnail grabber, which will let you save thumbnails locally on your devices.
Yes. Some YouTube thumbnail grabbers, such as ImageYouTube.com, automatically let you save Shorts thumbnails. With others, you will have to slightly modify the URL of the Short.
The best YouTube thumbnail grabbers are Get-YouTube-Thumbnail.com, ImageYouTube.com, YouTube Thumbnail Viewer, vidIQ Vision, and 50015.io.
