Download assets from Adobe Experience Manager

Last update: March 5, 2025

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AEM 6.5This article

You can download assets including static and dynamic renditions. Alternatively, you can send emails with links to assets directly from Adobe Experience Manager Assets. Downloaded assets are bundled in a ZIP file. The compressed ZIP file has a maximum file size of 1 GB for the export job. A maximum of 500 total assets per export job are allowed.

NOTE
Any user having read permissions at /var/dam/share location can access the download link shared in the email message.
Any user having read permissions to /var/dam/jobs/download location can download assets.
The asset types - Image Sets, Spin Sets, Mixed Media Sets, and Carousel Sets cannot be downloaded.

To download assets, follow these steps:

  1. In the upper-left corner, click the logo. In the left rail, click Navigation.

  2. On the Navigation page, click Assets > Files.

  3. Navigate to a folder that contains assets you want to download.

  4. Select the folder or select one or more assets within the folder.

  5. On the toolbar, click Download.

  6. In the Download dialog box, select the download options you want.

    Export or download optionDescription
    Create separate folder for each assetSelect this option to include each asset you download–including assets in child folders nested under the parent folder of the asset–into one folder on your local computer. When this option is not select, by default, the folder hierarchy is ignored and all assets are downloaded into one folder in your local computer.
    Email

    An email notification is sent to the user. Standard emails templates are available at the following locations:

    • /libs/settings/dam/workflow/notification/email/downloadasset.
    • /libs/settings/dam/workflow/notification/email/transientworkflowcompleted.

    Templates that you customize during deployment are available at the following locations:

    • /apps/settings/dam/workflow/notification/email/downloadasset.
    • /apps/settings/dam/workflow/notification/email/transientworkflowcompleted.

    You can store tenant-specific custom templates at the following locations:

    • /conf/<tenant_specific_config_root>/settings/dam/workflow/notification/email/downloadasset.
    • /conf/<tenant_specific_config_root>/settings/dam/workflow/notification/email/transientworkflowcompleted.
    Asset(s)Select this option to download the asset in its original form without any renditions.
    The sub assets option is available if the original asset has sub assets.
    Rendition(s)A rendition is the binary representation of an asset. Assets have a primary representation - that of the uploaded file. They can have any number of representations.
    With this option, you can select the renditions you want downloaded. The renditions that are available depend on the asset you select. The option is available if the asset has any renditions.
    Smart CropsSelect this option to download all the smart crop renditions of the selected asset from within AEM. A zip file with the Smart Crop renditions is created and downloaded to your local computer.
    Dynamic Rendition(s)Select this option to generate a series of alternate renditions in real time. When you select this option, you also select the renditions that you want to create dynamically by selecting from the Image Preset list.
    In addition, you can select the size and unit of measurement, format, color space, resolution, and any optional image modifiers such as inverting the image. The option is only available if you have Dynamic Media enabled.

  7. In the dialog box, click Download.

When you select a folder to download, the complete asset hierarchy under the folder is downloaded. To include each asset you download (including assets in child folders nested under the parent folder) in an individual folder, select Create separate folder for each asset.

Enable asset download servlet

The default servlet in Experience Manager allows authenticated users to issue arbitrarily large, concurrent download requests for creating ZIP files of assets visible to them that can overload the server and the network. To mitigate potential DoS risks caused by this feature, AssetDownloadServlet OSGi component is disabled by default for publish instances.

To allow downloading assets from your DAM, say when using something like Asset Share Commons or other portal-like implementation, manually enable the servlet by way of an OSGi configuration. Adobe recommends setting the permissible download size as low as possible without affecting the day-to-day download requirements. A high value may impact performance.

  1. Create a folder with a naming convention that targets the publish runmode (config.publish): /apps/<your-app-name>/config.publish. To define configuration properties for a run mode, see Run Modes.

  2. In the configuration folder, create a file of type nt:file named com.day.cq.dam.core.impl.servlet.AssetDownloadServlet.config.

  3. Populate com.day.cq.dam.core.impl.servlet.AssetDownloadServlet.config with the following. Sets a maximum size (in bytes) for the download as value of asset.download.prezip.maxcontentsize. The below sample configures the maximum size of the ZIP download to not exceed 100 kb.

    enabled=B"true"
asset.download.prezip.maxcontentsize=I"102400"

By default, for GET requests to download files, Experience Manager enforces a 50 MB limit on the ZIP archive’s download size. Downloads initiated via POST requests or the user interface are not impacted by this limit.