How to stop an animated gif from looping

Question

I have an animated gif in an img tag that I start by rewriting the src attribute. The gif was created, though, to loop and I only want it to play once. Is there a way, with Javascript or jQuery, to stop an animated gif from playing more than once?

Answer 1

I was having the same problem with an animated gif. The solution is rather simple.

1. Open the Animated gif in Photoshop.

2. Go to the Window tab and select timeline(if the timeline is not already open).

3. At the bottom of the timeline panel, you will find an option, which says "Forever". Change that to "Once".

4. Go to File> Export> Export for Web and save it as a gif.

That should do it.

Answer 2

can you find out how long the gif takes to loop once? if so then you can stop the image like this:

pseudocode:

wait until the end of the image (when it is about to loop)
create a canvas element that has a static version of the gif as currently displayed drawn on it
hide gif
display canvas element in a way that makes it look like the gif froze

javascript:

var c = $("canvas")[0];
var w = c.width;
var h = c.height;
var img = $("img")[0];
setTimeout(function () {
    c.getContext('2d').drawImage(img, 0, 0, w, h);
    $(img).hide();
    $(c).show();
},10000);

jsfiddle

edit: I forgot to add reference to the original answer that I took this from, sorry

Stopping GIF Animation Programmatically

that one doesn't address the time factor you need for only one loop

Also, it has been mentioned that this approach is problamatic in certain cases (It actually didn't work when I try it in firefox right now...). so here are a few alternatives:

1. mentioned by Mark: edit the gif itself to avoid looping. this is the best option if you can. but I've run into cases where it was not an option (like automated generation of images by a third party)

2. instead of rendering the static image with canvas, keep a static image version and switch to stop looping . this probablyhas most of the problems as the canvas thing

Answer 3

Based on this answer, it's kinda expensive, but it works. Let's say a single loop takes 2 seconds. At a setTimeout after 2 seconds kick in a setInterval, that would reset image source every millisecond:

setTimeout(function() {
    setInterval(function() {
        $('#img1').attr('src',$('#img1').attr('src'))
    },1)
}, 2000)

again, probably just a proof of concept, but here's demo: http://jsfiddle.net/MEaWP/2/

Answer 4

Actually it is possible to make a gif to stop after just one iteration or any specific number of iterations, see an example below (if it is not already stopped), or in jsfiddle.

To do that the gif must be created with number of iterations specified. This could be done using Screen to Gif, it allows to open a gif or a bunch of images and edit it frame by frame.

This solution also allows you to reset the animation by imgElem.src = imgElem.src; but this does not work in MS IE/Edge.

Answer 5

Jurijs Kovzels's answer works in some condition but not in all.
This is browser-dependent.
It works well with Firefox. But In Google Chrome and Safari, it does not work if the gif is on the same server. The example he provided works because the gif is on the external server.
To restart gifs stored on the internal server, using Google Chrome and Safari, you need extra steps to make it work.

const img = document.getElementById("gif");
img.style = "display: none;";
img.style = "display: block;";
setTimeout(() => {
  img.src = img.src;
}, 0);

This is inspired by this answer.

Answer 6

Not sure if this is the best way to respond to everyone and have it appear after all the previous answers and comments, but it seems to work.

I don't have much control over the gif. People post whatever gif they want as the "thankyou.gif in their account directory and then the ThankYou code runs whatever they've put there when a comment is submitted to a form they've posted. So some may loop, some may not, some may be short, some may be long. The solution I've come to is to tell people to make them 5 seconds, because that's when I'm going to fade them out, and I don't care if they loop or not.

Thanks for all the ideas.

Answer 7

I know I am pretty late here but..here it is...

I don't know if you would go to this length but let me share a trick.

Open the GIF in Macromedia Flash 8(it has deprecated since then), Export the GIF as Animated GIF. You will have to choose the file location. After that you would receive a dialog box with settings. In that, add the number of times you want the animation to happen. Click OK. Problem solved.