We’ve all downloaded files from the web to our computer. However, if you’d rather download files directly to your Google Drive account, there’s an extension for Google Chrome that allows you to do just that.
Access Google Drive on your phone or tablet. Get the Google Drive app to access all of your files from your Android or iOS device. Get it on Google Play. Download All Pictures and Videos from Google Photos. If you want, you can also directly save the archive to Google Drive, Dropbox or OneDrive, which is kind of nice.
Google’s Save to Google Drive extension allows you to save downloaded files directly to your Google Drive account, as well as save webpages to Google Drive as images, HTML files, or even Google documents. If you’re using the Google Drive desktop client for Windows or macOS, you can save downloaded files directly to your local Google Drive folder and they will be uploaded to your Google Drive account automatically. However, using the Google Drive client uses space on your computer, which isn’t ideal if you’re low on space. The Save to Google Drive extension can also be useful If you’re using Ubuntu Linux, which does not have an official Google Drive client.
NOTE: The Save to Google Drive extension saves files to the Google account you are signed in to in Chrome. So, switch to the Google Chrome profile that corresponds to the Google Drive account you want to save files to before using this extension.
We’ll show you how to install, set up, and use the Save to Google Drive extension in Chrome for Windows, but it works the same way on Chrome for macOS and for most common Linux distributions, such as Ubuntu.
Install and Set Up the Save to Google Drive Extension
To install the extension, visit the Save to Google Drive extension page in Chrome and click “Add to Chrome”.
A confirmation dialog box displays asking if you want to add Save to Google Drive. Click “Add extension”.
A button for the Save to Google Drive extension is added to the toolbar to the right of the address bar.
Before using the extension, we’ll set up the options for it. To do this, right-click on the Save to Google Drive button on the toolbar and select “Options” from the popup menu.
The options for the extension display on a new tab. By default, the extension is set to save files to the main My Drive folder in your Google Drive account. To change this, click “Change destination folder” in the Save to Folder section.
On the Select a Save to Folder dialog box, navigate to and select the folder in which you want to save files by default and click “Select”.
NOTE: You can still change the Save to Folder for each file you save to Google Drive. If you want to save most files to the same location, this setting makes it quicker to save files to your predefined location.
The Save to Google Drive extension also allows you to save a webpage as an image of the entire page (default), an image of the visible page, raw HTML source, a web archive (MHTML), or even as a Google Document. In the HTML pages section, select the format you want to use when saving webpages. If you’re downloading Microsoft Office files or comma-separated files, you can automatically convert these files to Google Docs format, by checking the “Convert saved link to Google editor format” box.
Once you’ve made your selections, click the “X” on the Options tab to close it.
Download a File Directly to Google Drive
To save a downloadable file to your Google Drive account, right-click on a download link and select “Save Link to Google Drive” from the popup menu.
The first time you save a file or webpage to Google Drive using the extension, a dialog box displays asking you to allow the extension to access and use the information listed. Click “Allow”.
The Save to Google Drive dialog box displays and the downloaded file is saved to your Google Drive account either to the main My Drive location or to the folder you specified.
You can also change the name of the downloaded file to whatever you want by clicking “Rename”.
Change the file name in the Rename box and click “Apply”.
Click “Close” to close the Save to Google Drive dialog box.
The webpage file is saved to your Google Drive account.
Save a Webpage Directly to Google Drive
To save a webpage to your Google Drive account in the format you chose on the Options page, click the “Save to Google Drive” button on the toolbar.
The webpage image, HTML, or Google Document file is uploaded to your Google Drive account either to the main My Drive location or to the folder you specified.
Once the file is uploaded, you can click “Rename” if you want to change the file name.
Change the name of the file (leaving the file extension alone) in the Rename box and click “Apply”.
You can change the location where the file will be saved in your Google Drive account by clicking the “(change)” link, which opens the Options tab again. If you click “(change)”, the Save to Google Drive dialog box automatically closes. If you’re not changing the location, click “Close”.
The webpage file is saved to your Google Drive account.
Due to security restrictions, when saving webpages using the Save to Google Drive extension, you cannot save chrome:// pages, such as chrome://extensions or chrome://flags, or Chrome Web Store pages.
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Is it possible to download all folders from a shared Google Drive folder? I don't want people to have to download > 300 files individually. I am sending this to people that don't have Google accounts, so they can't just press the blue Google Drive button I assume.
8 Answers
Download Everything In Google Drive
The simple answer to your question is: if the person you are sending the link to does not have a Google account, they will not be able to download all the files in the folder at once.
How To Download Multiple Files From Google Drive Without Zipping
Obnoxious? Yes. Yes it is.
Edit 9th Aug, 2017
As pointed out by qweruiop (thanks!), this feature is now (finally!) available:
2016 update . This still isn't possible in Google Drive, and, judging by the frosty response from Google when asked about it, it seems to be by design. It honestly looks like if you're sharing with friends, family or colleagues who might not have Google accounts, Google wants the user experience to be bad.
If you're the person receiving the shared folder, you're stuck. Google says no.
Since the question is from the point of view of the person creating the shared folder, there are two workarounds I'm aware of:
- Similar to Victor's suggestion: create folders as normal, and also, into your master folder, upload a massive ZIP file containing all the files, so that everyone can browse the files in Drive but non-Google 'heretics' can also still download conveniently despite Google's efforts. If bandwidth or file capacity isn't an issue, and if people will be happy with the choice between one-at-a-time downloads or everything-at-once downloads and nothing in between, this might be an acceptable compromise.
- Forget Google Drive and set up a free OneDrive account intsead. This is how I'm solving the problem - it has exactly the feature I wish Google Drive had. Here's a screenshot from a shared folder viewed by someone with no account not logged in who simply followed a link:
Clicking that 'Download' button with nothing selected simply downloads everything, as one zip file. Or you can select and download individual folders. Nice!
The only downside I noticed in switching from Google Drive to OneDrive is, OneDrive's web view doesn't (currently) have a handy 'Upload folders' option, like Google's. If you're using the web view, you have to create the folders manually, then select all in your folder and upload the contents. It's not too bad though, 5 clicks instead of 1.
There's one other big advantage to OneDrive from a content creator's point of view: you can chose a sort order, including manual sort, and save it to be the folder's default sort order for people viewing it. Viewing users can choose and save a different sort order for themselves, if they want, but you can control the default order.
You can create a compressed folder of the files and share a link to that compressed folder for them to download.
Step 1: Put your Drive into list view
Step 2: Click the first file in the list, then hold shift and down to highlight the rest of it.
Step 3: (Optional) Hold shift and click on anything you don't want to include in your e-mail in order to un-highlight it and keep it out of the downloaded file.
Now that you have your files highlighted, some new icons should have appeared in the toolbar on the top right side of your Drive. Not the toolbar with the round picture of you (or a generic blue dude) on the right-hand side of it. The toolbar directly beneath that one with the little gear on the right-hand side.
Step 4: Click on the icon that looks like this three dots stacked on top of each other.
Like this --->⋮
Step 5: Select 'Download' from that dropdown menu.
If you do have a google account the UI is a bit different. There are breadcrumbs at the top showing the path to the folder you're in. After the current folder's name is a caret with a drop-down menu with a Download option. Clicking on that opens a little pop-over at the bottom showing the progress of zipping the folder into a file. When that is complete, your browser begins downloading the zip file.
If you just want to download some files, you can click on them using CTRL and SHIFT for multi-selecting. Then there is a vertical dots button at the top right with a download option that does the same thing.
Use the download feature. Select the files you want to download. Choose the More and select Download...
A window will popup asking what format you want to download the files in. Make your choice, then click the blue download button.
Note: this was found in Google Drive Help.
You can actually select all the pictures shared with you and click on ADD TO MY DRIVE. And then locate the pictures in your current my drive folder and select to download the entire folder! ;-)
ATM you can add the shared content to your drive (option on top right) and from there you can download the folder which will be automatically zipped.
protected by Community♦Jul 19 '15 at 6:12
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