Can You Make GIF Animate on Scroll in Webflow?

Webflow is a powerful web design tool that allows you to create stunning websites without any coding knowledge. One of the most popular features of Webflow is its ability to make elements animate on scroll.

While this feature is commonly used for text and images, many people wonder if it’s possible to make GIFs animate on scroll in Webflow. In this tutorial, we will explore this possibility and show you how to achieve this effect.

The Challenge

By default, Webflow does not provide an option to animate GIFs on scroll. However, with a little bit of HTML and CSS magic, we can overcome this limitation and create a captivating user experience. To accomplish this, we will use the <video> tag instead of the <img> tag for our GIFs.

The Solution

To start, let’s assume you have already uploaded your GIF as a video file in the Webflow asset manager. If not, go ahead and upload your GIF as a video file before proceeding further.

We will begin by adding a new section where we want our animated GIF to appear on scroll. Inside this section, we will add a <div> element with a class name of “gif-container”.

<section>
    <div class="gif-container"></div>
</section>

Next, let’s add some custom CSS to our project to make the magic happen. Go to your project settings and click on the “Custom Code” tab. In the “Head Code” section, insert the following CSS code:

<style>
    .gif-container {
        position: relative;
        overflow: hidden;
    }

    .gif-container video {
        position: absolute;
        top: 0;
        left: 0;
        width: 100%;
        height: 100%;
        object-fit: cover;
        opacity: 0;
        transition: opacity 0.5s ease-in-out;
    }

    .gif-container.video-playing video {
        opacity: 1;
    }
</style>

Now, let’s add some JavaScript to our project to trigger the animation on scroll. In the “Footer Code” section, insert the following JavaScript code:

<script>
    (function() {
      var gifContainer = document.querySelector('.gif-container');
      var video = gifContainer.querySelector('video');

      window.addEventListener('scroll', function() {
          var rect = gifContainer.getBoundingClientRect();
          var isVisible = (rect.top >= 0 && rect.bottom <= window.innerHeight);

          if (isVisible) {
              video.play();
              gifContainer.classList.add('video-playing');
          } else {
              video.pause();
              gifContainer.remove('video-playing');
          }
      });
    })();
</script>

Testing and Adjustments

Now that we have added the necessary code, it's time to test our animated GIF on scroll effect. Preview your project in Webflow's designer and scroll down to the section where you added the <div> element with a class name of "gif-container". You should now see your GIF animating as you scroll into view.

If your GIF is not animating as expected, make sure you have followed all the steps correctly and that your video file is properly uploaded in the Webflow asset manager. Additionally, you can experiment with adjusting the CSS properties and JavaScript code to achieve the desired effect.

Conclusion

While Webflow does not have native support for animating GIFs on scroll, we have shown you a workaround using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. By converting your GIFs to video files and applying some custom code, you can create engaging animations that enhance the user experience on your website. Now go ahead and unleash your creativity by adding stunning animated GIFs to your Webflow projects!