"I've recently seen the light and moved from iOS pushing myself up a P70. Loving this phone so far. I don't like to have WhatsApp saving photos automatically as I find it clogs my Gallery up with unwanted pictures. Is there a way I can save individual photos? Any help is welcome. Thanks!"
- From Reddit
Have you ever encountered a situation where you wanted to save a WhatsApp photo to your device but couldn't? By default, WhatsApp automatically saves all the photos you send and receive to your Android phone. If you've turned off this feature to save space on your phone or tablet, you might be wondering how to save WhatsApp photos on Android. There are several easy ways to do that, you can read and follow the detailed instructions below.
On Android devices, WhatsApp typically saves pictures to a specific folder within the internal storage or an external SD card (if used). Here's a detailed breakdown of where you can find these saved pictures:
Default Save Location - Internal Storage:
The most common path for WhatsApp saved images is: Internal Storage/WhatsApp/Media/WhatsApp Images.
This folder is automatically created by WhatsApp to store all the images you receive or save from the app.
External SD Card (if applicable):
If your device supports an external SD card and you've set WhatsApp to save media to this location, the path might be: External SD Card/WhatsApp/Media/WhatsApp Images.
However, note that the ability to save to an external SD card may depend on your device's settings and WhatsApp's compatibility with your SD card.
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When you download WhatsApp on your Android device, it will automatically save the photos and videos you receive in WhatsApp to the Gallery app. Besides, you will also get other options to save WhatsApp photos - manually download WhatsApp photos to your Android device, back up photos to your Gmail account, or save them to your computer.
The following content covers all 4 ways. You can read and try the way you love while reading.
You can manually export photos from WhatsApp to your gallery or any other location on your device. This process is quite straightforward, as long as you pay close attention.
How do I save WhatsApp photos to internal storage?
Step 1. Open WhatsApp on your Android phone.
Step 2. Tap the "gear" icon (Settings) and select "Chats".
Step 3. Click the contact's or group's name and tap "Save to Camera Roll" in the Contact Info or Group Info screen.
If you want to save WhatsApp images to your phone at any time without having to manually handle each one, you can also enable automatic saving of photos from the gallery. Here's how you can do it:
Step 1. Open WhatsApp, click the three vertical dots at the upper-right corner, tap "Settings" from the pop-up window, and hit "Chats".
Step 2. Enable "Media visibility" to make the stored photos shown in the Gallery's WhatsApp folder.
Step 3. Configure the "Media auto-download" settings under "Data and storage usage". Once done, it will automatically download photos to the Android Gallery app.
As a matter of fact, all Android devices are associated with Google. Thus, if you have a Gmail account, you can also save WhatsApp photos to your Gmail account easily and restore WhatsApp backup from Google Drive to your Android/iPhone later.
How to download photos from WhatsApp to a Gmail account?
Step 1. Unlock your Android phone, run WhatsApp, and tap the hamburger icon at the top-right corner to enter "Settings".
Step 2. Select "Settings" > "Chats" > "Chat Backup" and tap "Back up to Google Drive". Ensure that your WhatsApp is linked to an active Gmail account. Then follow the on-screen prompts to back up the WhatsApp photos to your Gmail account. Alternatively, you can also choose a backup frequency to let it back up automatically, such as daily, weekly, or monthly under the automatic backup feature.
The last recommended way to save WhatsApp photos on Android is using Coolmuster Android WhatsApp Recovery. This powerful tool helps you download photos from WhatsApp to a computer in one click and restore WhatsApp backups from the computer to a new device quickly.
The highlights of Coolmuster Android WhatsApp Recovery:
How to save WhatsApp photos from your Android phone to your computer? Here are the steps:
01Visit the Coolmuster official website, download, install, and launch Android WhatsApp Recovery.
02Connect your Android phone to your PC using a USB cable, select your mobile device, and click "Next".
03Once connected successfully, the software will begin scanning your Android phone for WhatsApp data.
04At this point, the software will prompt you to enable end-to-end encryption on your phone. Follow the on-screen tutorial to do so. After obtaining the key, the WhatsApp chat recovery software will automatically read it and enter it into the blank space. Then, you can click the "Confirm" button to continue.
05After the scan is complete, all your WhatsApp data (including WhatsApp photos) will be backed up to your computer.
Video guide
When hundreds of photos, videos, files, and messages are automatically downloaded from WhatsApp to your Android device weekly, you may want to disable the automatic syncing features to save the Android phone's tight storage space. To do this effectively, you can refer to these tips:
Step 1. Launch WhatsApp on your Android phone and head to "Settings".
Step 2. Tap "Data and storage usage", and turn off all options for both Wi-Fi and cellular data under the "Media auto-download" option and the "Media Visibility" option under Chats settings.
When the auto-downloading feature is disabled, you can manually save photos and other WhatsApp message attachments in the ways we provided above.
After reading this post, you will already know how to save WhatsApp photos on Android devices. If you want, you can manually download photos from WhatsApp to your phone without installing apps. However, that may take a little longer since you have to pick up the chats or groups, and the downloading process is prolonged. You can also allow automatic downloads of images to your phone, but this might result in many unwanted photos. Besides, if you choose the Gmail account's way, you will have to have a Gmail account linked with WhatsApp, and it still takes long because it consumes the network. Then, you may find only Coolmuster Android WhatsApp Recovery is the ideal way. It is easy to operate, secure, fast, and network-free during transfer. So, go ahead and try this worry-free way.
If you encounter any difficulty when using it, please feel free to leave a comment below.
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