A number of free stock photo sites offering high-quality, high-resolution images have emerged in the last few years. Thank you to the generous photographers who are making their work available! They’re giving schools, non-profits, charities, churches, bloggers, and budget-constrained folks access to some great images. Here are 10 of the best free stock photo sites I’ve found.
At the time of this writing, these sites offer print-resolution photos that are free for commercial use. (Always confirm licensing agreements before you download in case terms have changed.)
Of the best free stock photo sites, my 4 personal favorites:
1. Kaboompics
Kaboompics.com is a self-described “one woman show.” Karolina offers gorgeous lifestyle images. Search by topic, color, or photo shoot. The stock photos in this post came from her site.
2. Pexels
Pexels.com offers a wide variety, making it one of the best free stock photo sites. It has a search by color function where you click a colored dot to pull up matching images.
3. Unsplash
Unsplash.com has beautiful, atmospheric stock photos. They tend toward the generic, which makes them versatile for many projects.
4. StockSnap
Stocksnap.io features more people photos than the average free stock photo site.
6 other sites to check out:
5. NegativeSpace
Negativespace.co has lots of landscapes and tech, plus other random things. Many have vintagey filters applied.
6. Pixabay
Pixabay.com tends toward simple subjects. A chicken. A coffee mug. Some images are odd or cheesy, but next time you need a picture of sliced salami, you know where to go. (Stay out of the crappy vector section.)
7. ISO Republic and Foodie Factor
This one’s a twofer. ISOrepublic.com features architecture, cities, nature, tech and people. It has a nice sister site, FoodieFactor.com, for exclusively food and drink photos. Beware: there are ads all over both sites, so make sure you click the correct “download” button.
8. Jay Mantri
Jaymantri.com offers architecture, landscapes, and textures.
9. Makerbook
Makerbook.net pulls images from many of the best free stock photo sites into a collection “for startups,” so there are lots of desk surfaces, computers, and phones—sometimes with hands using them. They’re businessy.
10. Life of Pix
Lifeofpix.com features the usual architecture, nature, textures, and some people, with a few oddball images thrown in.
A couple drawbacks with the freebie sites
Compared to paid sites like Getty Images, iStockPhoto, and Shutterstock:
- The selection is more limited
- Search functions are less precise, so hunting eats up time. If you’re in a rush and need something specific, it’s probably worth your while to head directly to Shutterstock and cough up $20.
On the other hand…
Did I mention they’re free?
Wait, I found more. (Jan. 2019 update)
11. Canva
Canva’s stock images are downloadable after signing up for a free account. Of special interest: the new Natural Women collection, created to “challenge both gender norms and societal standards of beauty…women whose distinctive body shapes, facial features, or tattoos may not conform to the traditional norms of beauty, but who deserve to be seen and given proper representation.” Fair game for commercial use, so have at ’em!
12. Raw Pixel
A few other free stock photo sites I’ve just come across deserve mention. Rawpixel.com has quality images, and it represents more people of color than the average freebie site.
13. Startup Stock Photos
StartupStockPhotos.com is a collection of free, realistic tech and office interior shots. There’s no search function, so get ready to scroll indefinitely.
14. Burst
Powered by Shopify, Burst offers thousands of free, high-res images for websites and marketing campaigns. You’ll need to provide an email address to access the high-resolution images, but the low-res (925 px) versions can be downloaded with a single click.
15. Pikwizard
Pikwizard is another free stock photo site with a number of people pictures. Many are shot from behind or cropped (perhaps so they don’t need signed model releases?) This can be useful when a portrait that’s too specific can distract from your design or blog post. Clicking to download an image triggers a message advertising their Design Wizard software, but you can ignore it and just grab the photo.
For a roundup of BIPOC stock photo sites, check out this post.