How can I take screenshots of YouTube videos in full screen?

Question

I am trying to take a screenshot of a YouTube video in fullscreen.

When I pause the video and wait a moment, only the bottom UI bar (play/pause/seek) disappears. The top UI bar (Like/Share/More Info) stays there.

So when I press PrintScreen on the keyboard, the screenshot is polluted by this top UI bar. Is there any way to remove it while the video is on pause?

Why not just put a black box over the UI bar in the saved screen shot image? — Ƭᴇcʜιᴇ007, Sep 07 '12 at 21:06
@techie007 I wanted to find a way to get the screenshot without losing part of the image... — SemMike, Sep 08 '12 at 14:02
I don't have enough rep to answer, but I highly recommend the [Screenshot Youtube](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/screenshot-youtube/gjoijpfmdhbjkkgnmahganhoinjjpohk/related?hl=en) extension for Chrome. It works perfectly + can either copy to clipboard or save to file — Eric Wiener, Sep 21 '21 at 16:45
I write a [gist](https://gist.github.com/Tokenyet/e1389eb2620031dc0885b2857071d904) for It, use [tampermonkey](https://www.tampermonkey.net/) to install. The only shortcuts are `shift` and `ctrl`, you could play It w or w/out fullscreen. — Tokenyet, Dec 14 '21 at 15:51

score 42 · Answer 1 · edited Dec 17 '19 at 04:49

42

Bookmarklet to Hide All YouTube Video Progress/Toolbars with one click

(makes it easy to get a clean full-screen HD screenshot)

To ADD the Bookmarklet:

highlight the the text in the next box

javascript:(function(){var goaway=".ytp-chrome-top,.ytp-chrome-bottom{display:none;}";if("\v"=="v"){document.createStyleSheet().cssText=goaway}else{var tag=document.createElement("style");tag.type="text/css";document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0].appendChild(tag);tag[(typeof document.body.style.WebkitAppearance=="string")?"innerText":"innerHTML"]=goaway}})();
drag the highlighted text to your browser bookmarks toolbar
rename the newly created bookmark if desired

To USE the Bookmarklet (to remove progress/toolbars):

load any YouTube video
click the bookmark
All progress/toolbars are gone
(EVEN WHEN PAUSING VIDEO)

To RESTORE all toolbars:

refresh the page

To CONTROL VIDEO (without buttons toolbar):

Full-screen: double-click the video
Rewind/Fast Forward: left/right arrow keys

edited Dec 17 '19 at 04:49

G-Man Says 'Reinstate Monica'

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answered Mar 15 '16 at 02:50

oLinkWebDevelopment

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This is the correct answer. Worked perfectly. – Joshua Dance May 12 '16 at 22:11
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You can add `.ytp-gradient-top` and `.ytp-gradient-bottom` classes to the list to hide the dark gradient as well. – Sumit Apr 01 '17 at 09:53
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anyone knows what this one does: `if ("\v" == "v")` ? – JinSnow Sep 29 '17 at 14:20
@JinSnow Apparently it's a short hack to test if browser is Internet Explorer or not. source: http://ajaxian.com/archives/ievv – Adam Toth Jul 06 '18 at 00:04
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@Sumit I suggested edit to add gradients in the script so people can just copy paste and use the whole thing. Waiting for peer review. – hsandt Dec 16 '19 at 23:04
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@JinSnow Tests specifically if the browser is IE10 or below. – Slight May 07 '21 at 01:49

dashakol · Answer 2 · 2020-04-03T20:18:19.883

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A very simple solution which is working on Firefox. This will take a full screenshot of the YouTube video at the current time.

No need for downloading anything or adding anything to your browser.

The first right click will open the internal YouTube menu, leave that.
Right click again on the video so the browser menu will be shown
Click on "Save Snapshot As..." from there.

As shown below:

BTW, You can move frame by frame with , and . keys when the video is paused.

edited Apr 03 '20 at 20:18

answered Apr 03 '20 at 17:53

dashakol

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I was concerned this method might snapshot _everything_ (including the overlay and controls), but it does seem to save just the image, without the controls (and without the captioning information). – R.M. Jul 07 '20 at 21:24
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If only people would take a few more seconds to dig into the other answers before moving on this one would be at the top, as the answer provided here by @dashakol not only meets the OP question, but it is also the best from the bunch, since you don't need to install anything else, nor fiddle with code nor nothing. With this answer OP is literally three clicks away from saving the desired screenshot to his device. – solr Jul 28 '20 at 22:40

score 8 · Answer 3 · edited Oct 08 '15 at 16:37

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How about not pausing and hitting PrtScn when the timing is right. If that is not an option Windows 7 has a tool called Snipping Tool that will let you chop off the top UI bar, of course at the cost of losing that much video area.

edited Oct 08 '15 at 16:37

Josh

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answered Sep 07 '12 at 20:11

atr

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Thanks but it destroys part of the image, I could just discard that part with Paint but the point was to get the whole image... – SemMike Sep 08 '12 at 14:03
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Timing it like this is possible but super frustrating. :) – Joshua Dance May 12 '16 at 22:42

score 8 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 08 '15 at 16:37

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The only way I could find was simply to download the video from Youtube, play it in any media player and take a screenshot from there (either with the media player's screenshot option, or PrtScn on the keyboard).

edited Oct 08 '15 at 16:37

Josh

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answered Sep 08 '12 at 14:08

SemMike

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Just another way DRM hurts honest people. – Cosine Sep 15 '16 at 13:20

score 6 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 12 '17 at 00:24

As an extension of JumboDS64's extension of oLinkWebDevelopment's answer, I noticed that there is still a gradient at the top of the video, which can be removed with the name "ytp-gradient-top" for the complete, clean look. The updated command is:

javascript:(function(){var goaway=".ytp-gradient-bottom,.ytp-gradient-top,.ytp-chrome-top,
.ytp-chrome-bottom{display:none;}";
if("\v"=="v"){document.createStyleSheet().cssText=goaway}
else{var tag=document.createElement("style");
tag.type="text/css";document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0].appendChild(tag);
tag[(typeof document.body.style.WebkitAppearance=="string")?"innerText":"innerHTML"]=goaway}})();

billion thanks for this script. I really hated that gradient. It is a big trouble while taking clean screenshot at some point in YouTube playback to prepare some notes from video. — Mahesha999, Jan 26 '22 at 15:22

Hese · Answer 6 · 2016-01-02T12:12:09.110

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You can use http://www.youtubescreenshot.com to get a screen shot from custom position

edited Jan 02 '16 at 12:12

answered Apr 25 '13 at 18:55

Hese

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A similar site would be http://ytscreen.com which also takes various screenshots from a youtube video. – zeddex Dec 02 '15 at 20:37
While this link may answer the question, it is better to include the essential parts of the answer here and provide the link for reference. Link-only answers can become invalid if the linked page changes. - [From Review](/review/low-quality-posts/481828) – nKn Jan 02 '16 at 13:34
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@nKn This is not a regular link only answer but a software/website recommendation – clhy Jan 02 '16 at 15:01
@nKn the link is the answer. He could write about what it does, but if the link goes away so does the value of the answer. – Joshua Dance May 12 '16 at 22:42

score 2 · Answer 7 · edited Oct 22 '20 at 20:21

As an extension of oLinkWebDevelopment's answer, at the begining, "ytp-gradient-bottom" should also be deleted (that being the black gradient at the bottom of the video which is part of the pause toolbar). With that added, the command is:

javascript:(function(){var goaway=".ytp-gradient-bottom,.ytp-chrome-top,.ytp-chrome-bottom{display:none;}";if("\v"=="v"){document.createStyleSheet().cssText=goaway}else{var tag=document.createElement("style");tag.type="text/css";document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0].appendChild(tag);tag[(typeof document.body.style.WebkitAppearance=="string")?"innerText":"innerHTML"]=goaway}})();

This works but requires a "javascript:" in front of the text. — Mando Stam, Oct 19 '20 at 16:39

score 2 · Answer 8 · answered Jan 21 '17 at 11:42

Type these into Javascript Console:

document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-chrome-bottom")[0].style.display="none";

for bottom GUI;

document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-gradient-bottom")[0].style.display="none";

for bottom gradient;

document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-chrome-top")[0].style.display="none";

for top GUI;

document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-gradient-top")[0].style.display="none";

for top gradient;

document.getElementsByClassName("branding-img-container")[0].style.display="none";document.getElementsByClassName("branding-context-container-outer")[0].style.display="none";

for branding;

Here is the plain code:

document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-chrome-bottom")[0].style.display="none";
document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-gradient-bottom")[0].style.display="none";
document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-chrome-top")[0].style.display="none";
document.getElementsByClassName("ytp-gradient-top")[0].style.display="none";
document.getElementsByClassName("branding-img-container")[0].style.display="none";
document.getElementsByClassName("branding-context-container-outer")[0].style.display="none";

Note, you will have to navigate via keyboard controlls, but that isn't too hard (left arrow, right arrow, space)

score 0 · Answer 9 · answered Apr 03 '20 at 18:22

I personaly use Lightshot

This tool is usefull in so many ways and when you need a screenshot of a video you can just wait for the right moment, then press the Prt Sc button and then you can just adjust your image then save it in a folder, copy to your clipboard or even google search it.

It also comes with a basic editing tools like, pencil, marker, change of colors, adding text and some sharing capavility

user1534664 · Answer 10 · 2020-06-17T13:53:42.973

If you double right click a youtube video without moving the cursor, it overwrites the first menu with a second menu. If you then press "show controls", it opens a second set of controls hidden behind the default ones. If you then click the "fullscreen" button (of the second set of controls), you will go fullscreen.

Now that you're fullscreen, just double click the video, and the UI should disappear.

Use left click or press space bar where you want to pause.

How can I take screenshots of YouTube videos in full screen?

10 Answers10

Bookmarklet to Hide All YouTube Video Progress/Toolbars with one click

Linked

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