Your collection of animations and images is secured within the GifViewer app. You appreciate this privacy, but there are cases in which you want to get files out of GifViewer. For viewing or editing in other apps or to migrate your GifViewer app to another device, together with all your files and folders inside the app’s private storage.
Two options
The latest GifViewer version 2.3 supports making backups, cloud sharing and device transfer of the app. Which means that if you use the standard options to move all your apps to a new Android device, all files within GifViewer are transferred as well.
If that somehow does not work or if you just want to get one folder out of GifViewer, then the new Export screen is what you need. The rest of this article describes how this feature works.
Export screen in the GifViewer app
The export screen does not actually move files out of GifViewer, but copies them to a part of the app storage which is accessible to other apps.
You first select from where you want to copy. The screenshot below only shows the GifViewer icon, which means that all files and sub-folders will be copied. Tap “Start Exporting Files” to start copying, which will start with emptying the export folder within the app. So you can repeat this as often as you want without risk of duplicate files exported.
Wait for the result of the copy to the export folder of the app to appear. The below test of 470 files, together 1.35 Gigabyte, took 10 seconds:
Copy files out of the app’s Export folder
If you have a Pixel or OnePlus phone, the GifViewer Export Files typically appear as an extra file location in the File Explorer. Just tap on the hamburger icon (three horizontal lines) on the top left to see this:
Now tap on GifViewer Export Files to see your copied files and folders. Select them all to copy to a device folder (like DCIM) or Google Drive, so you can use them in another app or move to another phone.
Use Material Files app to move your exports
On a recent Samsung, the Files app does not show the GifViewer Export folder. For a few files, the file picker in the Google Mail app can be used. For many more files and entire folders, the Material Files app (not related to GifViewer) proves a good alternative. The app starts with showing the common storage locations:
Tap on the three horizontal lines on the top-left (a hamburger icon) to go to the next screen. There you tap on the + to select Android/data. Then tap on Android/data to go to app specific data stores:
On this (Android/) data screen, tap on the three horizontal lines on the top-left to get another view:
Now you have an overview of file storage locations where the exposed folders of your GifViewer app can be reached. Tap on GifViewer Export Files:
Here you can see the folders and files that your GifViewer app copied from the private app storage. Tap the three vertical dots on the top-right, to select all folders and copy them directly to your Google Drive. Or if that does not work, to a folder in device storage (typically DCIM) where your File Explorer has access. From there you can copy this GifViewer data to another phone via your computer or Google Drive etc.
Finally, the folders and files from GifViewer are on the shared device storage, where all other apps can use them.
Clean up GifViewer Export folder
As a last step, go back to the Export screen in the GifViewer app and tap on the bottom button “Clear Export Folder”. Now the copies of your private animations and images are removed from the export app folder. Only the original files remain, safely stored in the app folders where no other apps have access.