Here is my argument. Once the video is downloaded, I can watch it offline, anytime, and on any device. Even if my Internet connection is slow or non-existent. Another reason is that social media sites are fickle by nature. Let me explain. I have seen the rise and fall of several social media sites who were the Goliath of their times. MySpace, Friendster, and more recently, Google Plus. If you are anything like me, you would want to save Facebook videos to the camera roll on your iPhone. Let’s take a look at some mobile and web apps that make it possible. Also Read: 8 Sites/Apps to Download Facebook Videos on Android
Save Facebook Videos to Camera Roll
1. Screen Recording
Your iPhone has a native screen recording feature, which you can use to record a part of Facebook videos. This is useful in a situation when you just want to record a 2-minute clip of a 5-minute video. To get started, swipe down from the top right to bring up the Control Center. There you’ll find the screen recording option, (if it’s not there, you might have to add it to your home screen via settings). Next, go to the Facebook video you want to record, open the Control Center, and start recording. Orient the video and adjust the playback time to let it record, and when done open the Control Center again and hit stop recording. This will save the video (along with original audio) in the camera roll.
2. Siri Shortcut
Siri Shortcuts are an easy way to do things that are otherwise tedious and time-consuming. You can find a shortcut for almost anything on the internet or create one of your own. To download Facebook videos, we’d use Facebook Video Downloader, go ahead and install it on your iPhone using this link.
Before we can run the shortcut, we need the Facebook video URL to fetch the video but Facebook has gone to extreme lengths to hide the video URL. Here’s a quick workaround to find the URL. Go ahead and open a video on the Facebook app on your iPhone that you wish to download and tap the Share button on the bottom of the post. You’d see the Share sheet, tap Copy Link from the options.
Now, open Safari or any other web browser and paste the Facebook URL that we just copied. It would look something like the image below. Tap go on the keyboard to load the webpage.
When the page is loaded, you’d see that the URL has been unfurled and the URL bar has the correct URL that the shortcut can understand. Copy this URL to the clipboard.
After copying the Facebook Video URL, simply run the Facebook Video Downloader shortcut from the Shortcuts app.
The shortcut would take a few seconds to fetch the video from the URL provided. Once the Video is fetched, the shortcut would save the video to your iPhone’s Camera Roll automatically. You can open the Photos app and find the video there.
3. Safari
The above method does seem overkill and if you don’t wish to install a Siri Shortcut, you can use this method that just requires you to open a webpage in Safari and download the videos directly. First, go ahead and find the video that you wish to download from Facebook. Tap the Share button on the bottom right of the post and tap Copy Link.
Once you have the link copied, open the Safari browser and go to https://fbdown.net. After the page has finished loading, paste the Facebook URL in the input field.
After that, simply tap the Download button next to the input field to load the video fetched through that URL.
You’d now see a preview of the video and the available quality of videos that you can download. Simply press and hold the download button and you would get a peek menu, tap “download linked file” to begin the download.
The video would start downloading in the Download manager, after it is finished downloading, tap the video and open the Share menu by tapping the button on the bottom left.
Tap Save Video and you’re done. The video has been saved to the Camera Roll.
Also Read: How to Watch Facebook Videos with Friends
4. Third-party app for older iPhones
All of the above methods work great on iPhones running iOS 13 and above but if you have an iPhone that is running on IOS 12 or below, you won’t be able to download videos from Safari directly. That’s why Friendly for Facebook exists. It’s a compact browser designed to let you surf Facebook and download videos with just a tap. To be honest, it’s the easiest method on this list. Go ahead and install the Friendly Social Browser on your iPhone with this link. Once the app is downloaded on your iPhone, log in to your Facebook account within the app.
Open a video that you wish to download and tap the Download button on the bottom of the post, next to the Share button. It would open a sharing menu, tap the download button next to the video.
It would prompt you to select a location, tap Save to Photos, and allow access to the Photos app. That’s it, your video has been successfully saved to the Camera Roll.
Save Facebook Videos to Camera Roll
These are some of the best ways to save Facebook videos on your iPhone in the Camera Roll. I shared more options because now you have a choice. Sometimes, some web apps are unable to download a particular video while another site is able to download it. What do you think? Let me know in the comments below. Also Read: 8 Sites/Apps to Download Facebook Videos on Android
