How to Download YouTube Thumbnail Images of any Video
Why one needs to download YouTube thumbnails? Basically, the bloggers who publish viral video contents on their blogs need the thumbnails to set as article image or feature image. They can use any screenshot tool to grab the images of a video, but can’t capture the cover image without the play mark on it. After uploading a video on YouTube, it automatically produces 3 thumbnails from that video. You can select either 1, 2, 3 or can upload your own image to appear as a video thumbnail.
How to Download YouTube Thumbnail Images?
For videos with auto-generated thumbnails, you can normally get the thumbnail image in 120×90 resolution. Obviously, this size is too small to use it on your article or for any other purpose. Therefore, you need to get the video’s custom thumbnail image and there are three options to get it.
In order to download YouTube thumbnail images, you need a video ID first. To find the video ID, open any video on YouTube and copy the texts after “v=”. Follow the below example to clear your doubts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Db4GX_oK214
Also read: How to enable YouTube safety mode
After copying the ID, follow the below procedure to download your required size image.
1) Download auto-generated 3 default thumbnails
Copy the below URL on the address bar and replace the Video_ID (Red Text) with your own ID. You can download 1, 2, or 3 number thumbnail by changing the number like 1.jpg, 2.jpg, etc.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/Video_ID/1.jpg
Ex: https://img.youtube.com/vi/bQVoAWSP7k4/1.jpg
2) Get Thumbnail: Low Quality (320×180)
Once again, replace “Video_ID” with your own video ID.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/Video_ID/mqdefault.jpg
3) Get Thumbnail: Medium & High Quality (480×360)
Replace “Video_ID” with your own video ID to get Medium and High-quality 480×360 size image.
Medium: https://img.youtube.com/vi/Video_ID/0.jpg
High: https://img.youtube.com/vi/Video_ID/hqdefault.jpg
4) Get HD Thumbnail : 720p or 1080p
This option is only possible when the video is available in 720p or 1080p resolution.
https://img.youtube.com/vi/Video_ID/maxresdefault.jpg
Download YouTube Thumbnails with Online Tool
If you don’t want to put URLs manually on the address bar, then there is an online tool which automatically generates all thumbnails in different sizes at one place. This tool is very easy to download YouTube thumbnail images.
Visit on YouTube Video Thumbnail Downloader tool and paste the video URL on the box. Now hit on “Fetch Thumbnails” button to see all possible sizes. In order to save it on your computer, just right-click on an image and select “Save image as…” option. Now choose a path to save that image.
This is all about, how to download YouTube thumbnail images of any Video. If you have any question regarding this, then feel free to share with us.