Photography & Video

15 Animated GIFs on Twitter, from Brands

In “12 Free Animated GIF Creators,” my article last week, I addressed tools to create animated GIFs for your website, email, and social media campaigns. In this article, I am highlighting some examples of animated GIFs from brands on Twitter. These GIFs serve a variety of purposes — demonstrating products, providing inspirational and educational content, celebrating events, or just having fun.

Hewlett-Packard

Celebrating its 75-year history, HP produced this GIF to convey how the founders flipped a coin to determine the name of the company. A simple animation can tell a big story.

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Starbucks Coffee

This animated GIF from Starbucks is a whimsical scene of its product in motion. It’s also a good metaphor for what Starbucks’ customers want from coffee.

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Samsung Mobile

This GIF from Samsung Mobile shows the multi-user mode of its new tablet. The GIF quickly and clearly illustrates the product’s functionality.

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Wendy’s

Here is a GIF from Wendy’s that showcases clever logo design, together with looping animation.

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About.com

This sequence of images from About.com presents a quick instructional GIF on how to cook bacon. It’s a useful demonstration of a popular item.

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Fiat USA

This GIF from Fiat is exciting and funny, highlighting its car with cartoon horses, along with a few ridiculous live-action horses.

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NASA

This animated GIF from NASA is a simulation of an upcoming mission — the first flight test of Orion. The inspirational animation and article link is a good lead generator for the mission’s web page.

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AT&T

This GIF from AT&T celebrates the official start of summer with a seasonal image. It also turns looping animation into endlessly watchable waves.

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Visually

Visually is a marketplace for original visual content. This GIF on disaster areas engages the viewer with a question and demonstrates a powerful infographic.

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Google

This animated GIF from Google was posted last year during the World Cup soccer tournament. It’s another good example of using a GIF to celebrate an event.

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[adult swim]

[adult swim] is a television production company that make funny cartoons for adults. This GIF conveys the company’s irreverent humor and style.

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Taco Bell

This GIF from Taco Bell is another example of using animation to enhance a logo. The quick animation loop provides the right timing for the sparkles.

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Oreo

Oreo is a brand that frequently runs animated campaigns on social media. This GIF is from its recent #OREOCookieBalls holiday campaign. It’s a good example of how multiple GIFs can be used to tell a story.

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Denny’s

This GIF from Denny’s is another example of animating a universally loved product like bacon. However, in this short, Denny’s uses the iconic quality of bacon to promote its restaurant.

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GAP

This GIF from Gap is a good example of using the format to display a product in action. It’s also a helpful example of how dynamic content can be created and a story told with as little as three images.

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Sig Ueland
Sig Ueland
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