If you’ve written blog posts or articles before, then you may have struggled to find stock photos for free. What are the big names in stock photography? Sure, there’s Adobe Stock and Shutterstock, but the costs of using those photos can really add up fast. I want to let you know about five of the best sites to download stock photos for free.
Where to Find Stock Photos for Free
Before we dive into the five best places to find stock photos for free, it’s important to emphasize that following: do not use images off Google Images, Bing Images, etc. without checking the license on the website the image is from. It’s extremely likely that the image has all rights reserved or has an otherwise restricted license. By default in the U.S. at least, all images are copyrighted by default and are not licensed for use by the public. Now that I noted this, let’s jump into the five best websites to find stock photos for free. Do note I did not list these websites in any particular order, but I hope you find this list useful.
1. Pexels
Pexels is one of the best websites to grab stock photos for free. Images can be used for commercial or non-commercial purposes and attribution is not required. You can read more about their license here.
2. Pixabay
Pixabay is another fantastic source for free stock imagery. The site has a very similar license to Pexels, which you can read here.
3. StockSnap
I have only heard about StockSnap fairly recently, but was pleasantly surprised by the website. All images on StockSnap are governed by the CC0 license, which they explain more here.
4. Unsplash
Unsplash is one of the most popular websites distributing stock photos for free. Like the other websites in this guide, photos on Unsplash are licensed for commerical or non-commercial use with no attribution required. I would say I use Unsplash the most for my business. However, I stumbled across this article explaining a situation where a photography was sued for using a photo from Unsplash. I’m thinking about using one of the other websites in this guide instead for everyday use. However, because of the professional quality photos, I will still recommend Unsplash. I would only suggest keeping records of the photos you use from that site.
5. Reshot
Reshot is a huge collection of handpicked free stock photos. Photos on Reshot have a similar license to the other websites above, which you can read more about here.
Conclusion
With the best websites for obtain stock photos for free, what content can you create? Add a comment down below and tell me what your favorite place to download stock photos for free is. Is it on this list, is it something new? I would love to know!