A TikTok download guide: how a TikTok video down­load­er works

Whether it’s your own TikTok videos or videos from others, the TikTok app has a built-in feature for TikTok video download. For your own videos, you just need to enable ‘Save to device’ in the settings; for videos from others, it depends on whether they allow downloads. Besides, there are third-party apps that can be used to download TikTok videos without wa­ter­marks.

TikTok app:

1. Sign in to the TikTok app.
2. In the settings, enable ‘Save to device’. New own videos are then auto­mat­ic­ally saved on the device during uploads.
3. You can download your own posted videos via the three-point menu by ac­tiv­at­ing ‘Save video’.
4. For third-party videos, use ‘Save video’ if the account allows downloads.
5. Al­tern­at­ively, use the ‘Share’ button and send the video to yourself via email or as a Messenger message (file will be saved in library).
6. As a second al­tern­at­ive, use third-party apps for TikTok download like ‘Snaptik’ or ‘Video Down­load­er for TikTok - No Watermark’.

PC:

1. Download an app like BlueStacks (for Android emulation on PCs).
2. Open the Google Play Store through BlueStacks and download TikTok.
3. Open TikTok on the PC and record videos via screen capture.
4. Al­tern­at­ively, use the TikTok web version to download video by logging into the TikTok website.
5. In the web app, the same app features are available except for camera access.

It’s been im­possible to overlook TikTok for a long time now, with around 689 million users (as of 2021). The social media and video sharing app’s colourful, quirky short videos inspire young people in par­tic­u­lar, but also offer artists and in­flu­en­cers the op­por­tun­ity to gain new fans. Since some videos are so stunning, funny or im­press­ive that users want to download and save them, the question arises: is that even possible?

In fact, TikTok offers a video download feature. With this, new uploaded videos are auto­mat­ic­ally saved on the smart­phone. Videos that have already been uploaded can be saved af­ter­wards.

If you want to save videos from other users, it depends on whether they allow the download. If so, you will find the ‘Save video’ function in the menu of the video in question. If the function is not activated, you can forward the video via ‘Share video’ as a file via e-mail or to your messenger, e.g. WhatsApp. Al­tern­at­ively, third-party apps are available for down­load­ing online videos.

Step 4: Since probably many TikTokers have disabled the download function, you can cir­cum­nav­ig­ate this. On the video page, tap the ‘Share’ button. You can share the video and send it to your own email address or social media account, for example. If you share it via WhatsApp, for example, you will find it in your WhatsApp media library on your smart­phone. In this case, videos will be wa­ter­marked.

If they want to download TikTok videos, even then when account holders do not allow the download, third-party apps such as ‘Snaptik’ or ‘Video Down­load­er for TikTok - No Watermark’ are available. With these, you use an ad­di­tion­al download button added by the TikTok video down­load­er app. Al­tern­at­ively, you can also copy video links into the app and save the video as a file.

Screen capture of TikTok videos: Whether in the emulator app, or the web version, an easy way to save TikTok videos is to capture a screen­shot in Windows 11 or take a screen­shot in Windows 10. Just play the video you want after the screen capture has started. Of course, you can also use mac screen record.

When asked whether TikTok video downloads are legal from a copyright per­spect­ive, there is a clear answer: it depends. For example, until 2020, TikTok was still offering back­ground music for which it had no user rights. In 2020, TikTok finally announced that it had signed multi-year copyright deals with in­ter­na­tion­al rights holders such as Universal Music Group, NMPA, and APRA AMCOS. Pre­vi­ously, then, TikTok users were operating in a grey area of copyright in­fringe­ment, for which TikTok did not accept re­spons­ib­il­ity in its T&Cs. Due to the published deals, it can now at least be assumed that provided TikTok back­ground music does not violate copyright.

What about downloads? In the UK, there are some ex­cep­tions to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 such as the legal term https://www.gov.uk/guidance/ex­cep­tions-to-copyright#fair-dealing - external-link-window "Fair dealing">Fair dealing which helps to establish whether material is in­fringing on copyright. A private https://www.gov.uk/gov­ern­ment/news/quashing-of-private-copying-exception - external-link-window "copying exception">copying exception was in­tro­duced in 2014 per­mit­ting copies of material for private use. So if you download TikTok videos you may only use them privately. Because copyright law varies in­ter­na­tion­ally and a defin­i­tion of private copying does not exist in the U.S., you should only use private TikTok downloads of others’ videos in the UK. Also, whether TikTok is con­sidered a legal source can vary from country to country – see the efforts in the US to block TikTok.

Please note the legal dis­claim­er relating to this article.