fb-post-downloader

A Node.js tool (CommonJS) that allows you to download images from posts on the Facebook platform. This tool uses scrapping method, so if Facebook changes the website structure, fb-post-downloader may not work.

Installation

You can install fb-post-downloader by typing the following command:

npm install @classicdev/fb-post-downloader

fb-post-downloader supports the following Facebook url formats:

• https://www.facebook.com/share/1234567890
• https://www.facebook.com/1234567890/posts/1234567890/?mibextid=12345678

How to use

You need to import the fb-post-downloader module first

const dl = require("@classicdev/fb-post-downloader");

After importing, you can immediately use several available functions to download images from Facebook posts. Here's how to use it:

// Get the downloader
const downloader = dl.getDownloader();

dl.getDownloader() will return the following object:

{
  imagedl: async function(url) {},
  metadatadl: async function (url) {},
  bothdl: async function(url) {}
}

• downloader.imagedl(url): This is a function that functions to get the download URL to download images from Facebook posts, you can open it in a browser or download it directly using http/https
• downloader.metadatadl(url): This function is used to retrieve post metadata. Currently, it can only retrieve two types of metadata
• downloader.bothdl(url): This function is used to get the download URL and metadata at the same time

Here's how to use each of these functions

downloader.imagedl(url):

(async () => {
  const result = await downloader.imagedl("https://www.facebook.com/share/1234567890");
  console.log(result);
})();

Output:

• Posts with 1 image:

{
  downloadUrl: "https://..."
}

• Posts with multiple images:

{
  downloadUrl: [ "https://...", "https://...", "https://..." ]
}

downloader.metadatadl(url):

(async () => {
  const result = await downloader.metadatadl(url);
  console.log(result);
})();

Output:

{
  user: "Username",
  caption: "My post caption"
}

• result.user: Contains the name of the user who posted the post
• result.caption: Contains post caption

downloader.bothdl(url):

(async () => {
  const result = await downloader.bothdl("https://www.facebook.com/share/1234567890");
  console.log(result);
})();

Output:

{
  downloadUrl: "https://..." || [ "https://...", "https://...", "https://..." ],
  user: "Username",
  caption: "My post caption"
}

Final code example

const dl = require("fb-post-downloader");

(async () => {
  const downloader = dl.getDownloader();

  const downloadUrlResult = await downloader.imagedl("https://www.facebook.com/share/1234567890/");
  const metadataResult = await downloader.metadatadl("https://www.facebook.com/share/1234567890/");
  console.log(downloadUrlResult);
  console.log(metadataResult);
})();

Additional properties

dl.version();

To print a log showing the version of fb-post-downloader currently in use/installed

dl.getVersion();

To get the version of fb-post-downloader that is currently being used/installed

Notes

Output function: downloader.metadatadl(url) or downloader.bothdl(url)

• If the username or post caption fails to be retrieved, the output will be something like this:

{
  user: "Anonymous",
  caption: "Caption is not available"
}

• If the download url is not found, result.downloadUrl will be null.