10 Best GIF Editors & Makers to Edit Animated GIFs and Images

Updated Dec 6, 2022.
Best GIF Editors & Makers to Edit Animated GIFs and Images

GIF, which is short for Graphics Interchange Format, is a series of animated images or no sound videos that loop continuously without anyone touching the play button.

In today’s ever-increasing social world, GIFs have become a huge part of internet culture. GIFs are great, they are everywhere and can be used for a variety of tasks.

Savvy businesses use GIFs to pass across marketing messages to their online audience while individuals use them to chat in the same way you use an emoji. There are lots of GIF makers and GIF editors that help users instantly create an animated image.

In this guide, you will learn the best GIF editors to edit GIFs online, how to choose the best GIF editor, and which GIF maker should you pick.

Let’s get started.

Best GIF Editors to Edit GIFs Online

1. Veed.io

Best Online GIF Maker and Editor for Creating GIFs for Social Media Platforms

Veed.io is the Best Online GIF Maker and Editor for Creating GIFs for Social Media Platforms

VEED is an online GIF maker and editor that makes it easy for users to make and edit GIFs. It has a super simple online GIF creator, making it easy for users to create and edit GIFs quickly.

The online GIF maker creates GIFs by allowing you to upload files, edit them and save them as GIFs. You can upload different file formats such as GIF, MOV, MP4, or any other video file.

With VEED online GIF creator, you can add text to your GIFs, crop it, rotate the GIF images, and split animated GIFs. You can use it to resize your GIF to fit the size of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and other social media platforms.

VEED allows users to change the speed of GIF, either to make it faster or slower and add effects to it. You can share your GIF on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and more by using its single-click sharing feature.

The GIF editor helps you greatly reduce file size when you convert a video to GIF. You can convert your video into GIFs to make it easy to share with your friends and followers. VEED supports adding GIFs from Giphy or any other source.

Pricing

Veed.io Pricing Plan

VEED has three pricing plans: free, basic, and pro. The free plan is perfect for users who want a one-off quick project under 10 minutes and a file size limitation of 50MB. One major downside of the free plan is that it comes with a VEED watermark on all GIFs created with the plan.

The basic plan is ideal for individuals and small teams who want to enjoy a simple online video editing experience while the pro plan is suitable for larger teams that have more design needs and need collaboration control.

2. Creatopy

Intuitive Visual Platform for Creating and Editing GIFs

Creatopy is an Intuitive Visual Platform for Creating and Editing GIFs

Creatopy, formerly known as Bannersnack, is intuitive graphic design software that delivers a creative experience for teams and communicators.

The Ad design software is reliable and helps marketing teams to cut their design time by half. It has a wide range of design tools that makes it extremely easy for those with no graphic design skills to create their professional designs such as GIFs quickly.

Creatopy is an animation design software that anyone can use to create stunning and engaging animations such as email GIF, animated GIF, animated banner, HTML5 banner, and HTML5 animation.

The Ad design software has thousands of professional templates that are fully customizable. Users also get access to Shutterstock images and stock audio.

There is a wide range of free design tools available to users such as feed Ad builder and banner generator. The GIF maker and editor allow you to use different design elements, resize your GIF images, and edit your videos.

Pricing

Creatopy Pricing Plan

Creatopy has four plans: free, create, automate, and enterprise. The free plan gives you access to its free templates and graphic resources.

The ‘create’ plan allows users to create both static and animated designs, organize them into projects, and collaborate with others. The ‘automate’ plan helps your team automate the production and editing of your graphic design for better efficiency.

The enterprise design is suitable for teams with lots of editors who need more customized experience not available in the other three plans.

3. Kapwing

Best GIF Maker for Recording, Editing, and Downloading GIF Files

Kapwing is the Best GIF Maker for Recording, Editing, and Downloading GIF Files

Kapwing is a GIF maker that makes it easy for everyone including non-designers to create the perfect animated GIFs for use. Through its Kapwing Studio, users can create, record, edit, and download GIF files.

Using Kapwing to make your GIF is easy. The first step is to upload a picture, video, or GIF from your phone or computer by clicking on the visible “Upload File” button. If you have a link to a file you found on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and anywhere else, you can paste it in the “Paste a URL” box.

Kapwing gives users a helpful record tool that allows you to use your phone or computer camera or screen to create a GIF.

Kapwing Studio serves as its GIF editor. You can add text, images, animations, filters, transitions, and speed adjustments to your GIF. You can also crop your GIF to fit the dimensions you want. By clicking on the dropdown menu next to the Export button, you can easily convert your video file into a GIF.

There is a large library of text animations and special effects available on Kapwing Studio that you can apply to your GIF. For example, you can remove the original background from a video and replace it with a different background.

Kapwing does not show any ad or watermark your design even when you are using its free version. You can export your GIF file either by downloading it to your device or sharing it on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter directly from the Kapwing studio.

Pricing

Kapwing Pricing Plan

Kapwing has three plans: free, pro, and for teams. The free plan is suitable for users who have little GIF and design needs.

The pro plan is suitable for users who have large GIF and design needs, and need access to all tools and premium features such as downloading SRT files and uploading custom fonts. The for teams plan is ideal for large teams who want priority support and consolidated billing.

4. Canva

Best Graphics Maker for Non-Designers

Canva is the Best Graphics Maker for Non Designers

Canva is a photo editing software that helps non-designers to create attractive and engaging designs. The gif-making software helps users to create GIFs quickly with their team. You can use the GIF feature on the Canva app to add stickers to your picture or add a transparent effect to it.

The GIF maker provides you all the tools and features you need to design your GIF from scratch. Canva allows you to animate your design and make it easy to share with your family and friends via email, links, and social media.

Creating or editing GIFs on Canva is easy with its drag-and-drop elements. Simply drag the image or design element you want to use on the canvas or workspace to work on your GIF.

Canva’s vast library offers a large collection of GIF templates you can edit and personalize to suit your unique need. You will find beautifully designed templates that match your taste, preferences, and personality.

Pricing

Canva Pricing Plan

Canva has three main plans: free, pro, and enterprise. The free plan offers over 250,000 plus templates, hundreds of thousands of stock images, 5GB of cloud storage, and collaboration in real-time.

The pro plan has over 75+ million premium stock photos, videos, audio, and graphics, 420,000+ free templates with new designs daily, 100GB of cloud storage, and allows you to schedule social media content for up to eight platforms.

The enterprise plan is suitable for large companies who want to establish their brand’s visual identity and control team access. It has unlimited storage and 24/7 enterprise-level support.

5. PicMonkey

Best Animated GIF Editor for Graphics

PicMonkey is the Best Animated GIF Editor for Graphics

PicMonkey is a GIF maker with a rich collection of design tools. The GIF maker helps you create high-quality photos, social media graphics, GIFs, and other designs. Users can use it to create, edit, and save their GIFs all in one platform.

The graphic design application has hundreds of templates that users can use to create flyers, social media posts, cards, GIFs, and others. It offers more than 6 thousand textures and graphics. You can apply its pre-set animation moves to your graphics, photos, and text.

PicMonkey makes it easy to edit videos to GIF. It allows you to make GIFs from text animations. With its background erase feature, PicMonkey makes it easy to create your stickers.

The video-to-GIF editing software has powerful text tools that choose over 300 fonts. It offers easy-to-use wow-makers like outline, drop shadow, and curved text. Since 2020, PicMonkey has also been a video editing software.

With its easy-peasy motion tools, you can animate any graphic you want to slide in, roll in, or pop in. There are a total of twelve dazzlers you can use for your graphic.

Pricing

PicMonkey Pricing Plan

PicMonkey has three pricing plans: basic, pro, and business. It does not offer a 7-day free plan but offers free trials on its basic and pro plans.

The basic plan is best for rising creators, the pro plan is ideal for growing businesses while the business plan is suitable for users who want access to collaboration tools.

6. Lumen5

Best Meme Maker for Individuals and Businesses

Lumen5 is the Best Meme Maker for Individuals and Businesses

Lumen5 is a gif-making tool that allows users to create their online memes and GIFs. The platform allows you to use images, videos, and GIFs, and any file type to build your personalized meme.

The GIF maker has lots of amazing features that help users to create and edit photos and videos into GIFs such as file cropping, adjusting brightness, and selecting and customizing fonts of choice.

Lumen5 supports numerous formats such as AVI, BMP, GIF, JPEG, MOV, MP4, PNG, WMV, and more. It supports the sharing of the memes and GIFs you created or edited directly to various social media channels such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and others.

The meme maker allows you to create your unique online meme so you do not have to regurgitate the same old pictures as memes. Creating and editing memes is quick with Lumen5 meme maker.

You can select a custom template from Lumen5’s library of templates, add meme text, and make adjustments on the same platform.

The Lumen5 interface works flawlessly on both mobile and desktop. Irrespective of the device you are using — iPhone or Android, or the operating system you are using — Windows or Mac, the interface is designed to work flawlessly on every device.

Pricing

Lumen5 Pricing Plan

Lumen5 has five pricing plans: community, creator, premium, business, and enterprise. The community plan is free and ideal for casual video enthusiasts, while the creator plan is convenient for individual content creators.

The premium plan is suitable for professional video storytellers. The business plan is ideal for brands focused on reach and growth. The enterprise plan is suitable for large-scale teams.

7. Filmora Meme Generator

Free Online Meme Generator for Pictures, GIFS, and Videos

Filmora is a Free Online Meme Generator for Pictures, GIFS, and Videos

Filmora Meme Generator is an online application that allows users to make GIFs for free and easily. The application is connected to the Wondershare suite.

There are three steps to creating a meme on Filmora Meme Generator. First, you upload or drag an image, GIF, or video from your computer. If you have a link instead, you can paste it for upload. The only drawback is that the maximum file size must not exceed 50 MB.

Second, you insert the text caption you want to use into the image, GIF, or video you uploaded. It is easy to edit the text font, sizer, color, and position.

The final step is to export and download your meme. The available file formats that Filmora Meme Generator supports are MP4, PNG, JPG, and GIF files.

Pricing

Filmora Meme Generator is a free online resource.

8. Imgur

Best Video-to-GIF Maker and Editor

Imgur is the Best Video to GIF Maker and Editor

Imgur is one of the best video-to-GIF makers available in the market. The high-quality GIF maker allows you to create GIFS without needing to create an account. The interface is user-friendly and allows you to share your finished work with others.

There is a maximum non-animated file size capacity of 20MB. However, note that non-animated images uploads of more than 1MB for non-account holders and 5MB for account holders are loosely compressed to reduce the file size but retain the quality.

Animated images like GIFs and videos have a maximum file size capacity of 200MB for uploads. Imgur only supports video uploads of not more than 60 seconds, while GIF and video files above 2MB size will be automatically converted to GIFVs, which eliminates the sound.

Imgur supports multiple file formats such as JPEG, GIF, PNG, APNG, TIFF, BMP, PDF, XCF (GIMP). The TIFF, BMP, PDF, and XCF formats will be automatically converted to PNG on upload.

Pricing

Imgur allows you to create and edit GIFs for free.

9. Giphy

Best GIF, Sticker, and Backdrop Maker

Giphy is the Best GIF, Sticker, and Backdrop Maker

GIPHY is a design tool that helps users to create high-quality GIFs, stickers, and backdrops. You can edit your design with filters, captions, stickers, and other design elements.

The accepted formats for GIF uploads are JPG, PNG, GIF, MP4, or MOV, while the accepted file formats to convert to stickers are JPG or PNG.

GIPHY allows you to paste URLs from different sources such as Vimeo, YouTube, GIPHY, and others. The animated GIF maker software makes it easy for users to edit and arrange the uploaded files in the preferred order.

Pricing

GIPHY is free to use.

10. Gimp

Best Open-Source GIP Maker and Editor

Gimp is the Best Open Source GIP Maker and Editor

GIMP is a freeware and open-source GIF maker and editor with a user-friendly interface that helps users to enhance a photo in fewer steps. It supports saving files in several formats such as GIF, JPEG, PNG, and others.

The open-source GIF editor allows users to perform multiple undo and redo actions with over 100 readily available plugins.

It has a foreground extraction tool and provides transformable paths and selections. GIMP is supported on the Windows platform.

Pricing

Gimp is free to use.

How to Choose the Best GIF Editor?

Choosing the best GIF editor depends on your needs and preferences. While one GIP editor may be an awesome tool for users with little design skills, it may not be a useful tool for graphic designers who need more functionality than what that tool provides.

Despite the differences in user’s needs and preferences, you can choose the best GIF software by looking out for the presence of such overlapping and essential features and functionalities.

1. GIF Library

If you are new to designs or you have experience, you need to check out the presence of a well-stocked GIF library when choosing the best GIP editor. Ready-made GIFs helps those without design experience quickly create GIFs, and it can also serve as a source of inspiration for designers.

2. Screencast To GIF

Another feature to look out for is the screencast to GIF. Can the GIF editor or creator allow you to record from your screen and then convert it to GIF?

3. ‍Video To GIF

Can the platform convert videos to GIFs? A good GIF editor should convert video links from YouTube, Vimeo, and social media platforms into GIFs.

4. Add Text To GIF

When searching for the best GIF editor, check for the ‘add text to GIF’ feature. You should be able to write titles, subtitles, and even annotations on the animation.

5. Crop GIF Or Resize

Select a GIF editor that enables you to crop or resize any GIFs. It is an essential feature a GIF editor should have especially due to the size limitations of sharable platforms like email.

6. Watermark

Free GIF editors will often add their watermark on any GIF design you do on their platform. You can escape this hurdle if the watermark is a problem for you by going to paid GIF editors or the few free editors with no watermark such as Gimp.

7. Supported Platform

Consider the platform where you plan to use the GIF editor. If you plan to use it on the web, then look for a GIF editor that supports the platform. If you prefer a mobile app, choose a GIP editor that supports it. Ideally, the best GIF editor will support both platforms.

GIF Editor FAQ

What Is A GIF?

GIF is a great way to make your content more appealing. The full form of GIP is Graphics Interchange Format. 

In its simplest form, GIF is an animated image file. GIF refers to a series of images or soundless videos that loops constantly without the need to press the play button.

Can I Edit A GIF?

Yes, it is easy to edit a GIF. All you have to do is find a GIF editor and simply upload the GIF file in the appropriate section. Many GIF editors support the drag and drop feature for GIF upload, uploads directly from your computer or phone, or a URL.

Once you upload the GIF file, you can then add text, captions, speed up or slow down the GIF, and other design elements. You can upload video files and convert them to GIFs.

What Is The Best Free GIF Maker?

The best free GIF maker is Giphy. You do not have to download the software, just upload the supported file formats or paste URLs from different sources such as Vimeo, YouTube, GIPHY, and others. You can make edits and save the file.

How Can I Edit A GIF Online?

The first step is to upload the GIF or video to the GIF editor. After a successful upload, the next step is to make the edits. Some of the possible edits you can make include adding text, resizing, cropping, adding effects, captions, and changing color, text size, and more. The final step is to export the finished GIF, share or download it.

Which GIF Maker Should I Pick?

Picking a GIF maker can be a tricky affair due to the large number of options available on the internet. However, you can select the best GIF maker by considering your needs and the features you want to use.

VEED is the best online GIF maker for creating GIFs for social media platforms. Creatopy is popular for its intuitive visual platform for creating and editing GIFs. Kapwing is ideal for recording, editing, and downloading GIF files

Gimp and Giphy are free GIP makers and editors, while Filmora Meme Generator is a free online meme generator for pictures, GIFs, and videos.

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Anastasia Belyh

Editor at FounderJar

Anastasia has been a professional blogger and researcher since 2014. She loves to perform in-depth software reviews to help software buyers make informed decisions when choosing project management software, CRM tools, website builders, and everything around growing a startup business.

Anastasia worked in management consulting and tech startups, so she has lots of experience in helping professionals choosing the right business software.