How to Save An Image from Google Docs?
Extracting and saving images from the web is generally a piece of cake. All you have to do is right click and choose ‘Save as.’. But have you ever tried to save or download an image from Google Docs? It’s a whole different story. It is downright exasperating to say the least. There is no apparent way to select and download a few images directly from a docs document. Fortunately, we have worked around this drawback. Here are 5 simple ways to download images from any Google Doc.
1. Publish to the Web, then Save Images One-by-One
If you only want to extract a few images, this method is your best bet:
- Open your document in Google Docs, click on File > Publish to the web found on the top left corner.

- Click on the blue Publish button. Does your doc incoprorate confidential data or private information. Remember to stop publishing once you have got your images.

- A pop-up window appears. Click OK to continue.

- See the link that appears? Copy and paste it into a new tab on your web browser. Hit the Return or the Enter key to load the page.

- A web page will appear with the content of your doc. Locate the images that you want, right click on each, click on “Save Image As…” Specify the destination where you wish to save those images.

- Voila. You have got your images, but the work isn’t finished yet. Go back to your Google Docs document, again click on File > Publish to the web, see the “Stop publishing” button under Published content & settings”? Click on it and check OK on the pop-up, to stop publishing your doc.

2. Save The Images to Google Keep
This option is by far the least hassle-some. Google Keep is a note taking app that has recently been integrated with Google Docs. This comes down to the fact that you can save docs document images directly to the sidebar, from where they can be downloaded and saved directly without any frills. Here’s how you can save an image to Keeps:
- Right-click on any image that you want to download in a Docs document, and click on the “Save to Keeps” option.

- Your picture is saved to the sidebar, as shown in the screenshot below.

- To save the image, simply right click on the image from Keep sidebar, and click on “Save as”, specify a destination for the image, press the save button, and you have successfully downloaded the image.

3. Use A Snipping Tool
You must be familiar with the Snipping tool if you use Windows, or maybe you know Grab if you have a Mac. Both let you select a portion of your screen and capture it. This can help you take a snapshot of the image you want to download and save it as a copy.
- Open the Google Doc from where you want to download the image. Also make sure the image is in the center of the screen for best capture.

- Fire up the snipping tool.
- Select New and outline the image with your mouse cursor. This tool lets you capture the snapshot of your selected image.

- Click on File>Save as, specify the destination where you wish to save the file, give it a meaningful name, and click on Save.
While this is a relatively easy way to download an image, the images need to be manipulated to resemble the original sometimes. So, we can’t really say we are downloading here, we are just making a copy. However, this method is one of the easiest and fastest, and if you only occasionally need to download images from Google Docs, why bother grappling with Doc add-ons to extract images from Google Docs, when you have such a great trick up your sleeve.
4. Extract Pictures from Documents With Add-Ons
If you frequently need to download images from Google Docs, install an add-on that extracts pictures from Docs. Image extractor is a great add-on you can use. Install this add-on to begin.

- Once downloaded and installed, fire up the document from where you wish to extract images. To start, click on Add-ons > Image Extractor > Start to open the sidebar.
- Select the image you wish to download from the doc.
- The Image Extractor add-on pops-up in your browser’s right sidebar. Choose the image you want to save, select it and click the “Download Image” button. The image will be downloaded to your browser’s download folder. Voila! Easy as a breeze.
5. Download as Office Word, then Reuse the Images
You can use this method whenever you want to reuse the images that you have downloaded from Google Doc in Microsoft Office Word. Here’s how to do it:
- Select File > Download as > Microsoft Word (.docx). This converts your Google Doc to a word format. The word Doc will retain all your content and formatting, including the images.

- Fire up the exported Word document and then cut, copy, or save the images as you want.
