Top 10 Sources to Find Royalty Free Stock Photos

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Stock Photos

Research shows that 6.5 people out of 100 click on your Facebook posting.

Tell me if the stats isn’t pathetic. As a social media marketer, getting traffic from social media is like finding the highest quality gem among the other gems.

But with a little tweak, you can easily improve your Facebook (or any social media platforms) click through rates. Yup, tweaking the images you are sharing on these platforms.

After all, posting the right images could increase your follower’s engagement rate, right?

Here are some questions for you:

  1. Are you using those stock images you could find on Google images?
  2. Or maybe, copy and paste images from other blogs?
  3. Do you have a specific requirement for when searching for images?

Here’s the truth; the majority of the people (including the old me) prefer to do the easy way. That is to find images directly from Google, right click and save. Problem solved, right?

Trust me, this is one of the mistakes businesses does on social media. You need to picky, demanding and above everything, particular to details.

Here are my photo selection strategies:

  • It has to be high definition
  • Bigger in size (usually over 1,000 pixels)
  • Enhance and modify the photos on Canva or Photoshop
  • Optimize the photo size to save space

Here’s another trust me ‘thing’. Most people would throw in the towel even before reaching #2.

The above is just an example. I am not going to preach why I do that or how I do that. What you will find in this article would be the top 10 sources to find royalty free stock photos.

1. Flickr

If you need high-quality photos and fast, Flickr is one source you need to use.

There are 1 million photos uploaded each day on Flickr and there is absolutely no way that you can’t find a good stock photo for your blog post.

How to find royalty free stock photos on Flickr?

Use the advanced search feature. Fast, easy and light-weight.

You can’t wish for anything better than that!

Here’s an example of how you use Flickr advanced search:

You can choose from a series of license such as:

  • All creative commons
  • Commercial use allowed
  • No copyright restrictions

2. Shutterstock

If you are looking for really good and royalty free stock photos, Shutterstock may just be the best choice for you.

Used by thousands of marketers daily, you know that photos found at Shutterstock are just that good.

The downside? It costs a little money.

What I really love about Shutterstock are:

  • Unlimited usage
  • Editable (a big advantage here)
  • Commercial use
  • Simple pricing
  • 100% royalty-free

Some people say that Shutterstock is a little overpriced. What do you think? Remember to leave a comment below to discuss!

3. Getty Images

A good alternative to Shutterstock. Enough said.

Personally, I feel that the photos on Getty Images fit my requirements more than others. But that’s just me right?

Why do I love Getty Images? The answer: Options, options and more options.

Now, the bad part about Getty Images? The prices are pretty insane.

Getty Images is really useful if you are looking for serious photos for your upcoming monster project. Careful when buying as this could easily burn a hole in your pocket (or your marketing budget for the matter).

4. iStock by Getty Images

Another big time player in the royalty free stock photos that offers interesting pricing structure.

In terms of pricing, I wouldn’t say they are the cheapest and they are more towards the middle-class type.

Through my experience, photos purchased by iStock has better end results compared to other photo sources. You can easily find photos that have editing done instead of the plain stock photo feeling.

5. Bigstock

I don’t use Big Stock that often but it is still one of the highly recommended royalty free stock photo sources around today.

Compared to other photo sources, they only provide videos and images. And in terms of pricing (yup, it is really important right?), they are priced slightly higher than the rest of the pack.

There are 6 different packages that you can choose, which starts as low as $79 per month.

6. Fotolia

As of today, Fotolia is one of my favorite sources to find for royalty free photos and it has over 37.7 million stock photos which you can choose from.

One feature that I love about Fotolia is the ability to sort and find photos according to your requirements (or simply use the pre-determined settings).

Fotolia uses credits as a form of purchase and each credit costs approximately $1. Of course, buying more credit at any given time and you’ll automatically entitle for a discount.

7. 123RF

123RF is a popular source to find for royalty free photos. The advantages using 123RF is the different plans to fit your requirements and budget.

For example, you can opt for monthly subscription or on demand purchase (purchase only when you need the photos).

If you are looking for a source to purchase large quantities of photos, you can reach out to their support team for a specific quote.

8. Unsplash

Unsplash is my newest go-to site when I need to find some awesome royalty free photos.

And guess what? It’s completely free!

You can do whatever you want with these photos and no credits needed to be given (however, it is always a good practise to provide credits).

Since this is free photo source, there would be 10 images once every 10 days. Download, save and use them in anyway you want … without burning a hole in your wallet.

9. Gratisography

Another excellent source to find royalty free stock photos … and doesn’t cost you a dime.

For me, Gratisography is slightly different from Unsplash as each of the images are more vibrant in colour, having the ‘fun’ effect and have better graphical effects.

Grastisography doesn’t have a schedule for releasing photos and therefore, new photos will be uploaded after getting approval from the moderators.

10. MorgueFile

Morguefile offers free high definition photos

Last but not least and if you still can’t find the right stock photos, head over to MorgueFile.

MorgueFile is a source that provides royalty free photos at no cost to you.

MorgueFile is slightly more professional outlook and excellent if you are looking for photos for projects or business usage.

At the moment, it has over 370,000 stock images that you can choose from (and downl0ad).
Which is your favorite source to download royalty free photos?

As a recap, using the right stock photos could easily produce better image effects and at times, it can boost more readership and traffic as well to your website.

Do you have any particular source when it comes to finding royalty free stock photos?

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14 Responses

  1. Stacy Boone says:

    Nice selection,

    I recognise many of these but not all. So I keep storing these types of posts for references of go to points, so thank you :-)

    I much prefer having full control of images and not giving credits so legitimate free sources or buying full rights is for me the preferred option. Obviously completely price and royalty free is best. Although I always stick to copyright laws, never worth risk breaking those and very negative for the impression you make.

    Whilst I never used Getty I get the impression they are huge. Virtually every picture I see on the news now or big name online publications seem to be using Getty images.

    High resolution is good advice for social media. I do tend to keep struggling though in terms of applying the best size dimensions so the picture shows correctly and in full. Facebook rules for example keep changing.

  2. Mary Young says:

    Wow, this is a great list Reg! Thanks for sharing these. I’ve been using Pixabay but I need other sites to keep the images looking fresh.

    You’re right about Getty Images. They have some cool ones but geeze are the prices crazy, at least for me it is ;). I never went back there LOL.

  3. Great blog, well said (or showed!). I would add that you shouldn’t stop with your website, use real, genuine photos (not stock photos) in emails, social media, and print collateral.

  4. Von Figueroa says:

    Try and take your own images!
    That way you own the right to them and other people can’t use them on their blogs so you won’t have the “I’m sure I’ve seen that image somewhere before. Oh yeah, it was on *insert top blog in your niche here*!”. Plus by using your own pictures you’re letting readers into your life a little more and they feel like they know you better

  5. I agree with staying away from cheesy stock photos. Yes, it takes a little thinking and some creativity but in the end I believe it will help not only increase traffic but revenues as well.

  6. Robby Joyce says:

    Nice Post! Catchy images are always good to boost your conversion but these days will web 2.0 , i think using video is creating a lot of impact , sites like fiverr have started users to upload video of their product and its is really working for sellers at least it is for me. what do you think?

  7. We are making changes with our website images and considering both the options of either using rights managed images or our own people’s images. I think its important to understand your target audience while selecting images for websites. Talking primarily about small companies, If you have a local client base or target market then you’d be better off posting your own images such as real estate agents, restaurants, motels and others. On the other hand, if your deal with primarily national/international clientele and your scope of business is large than “carefully selected” rights managed images would do the trick.

  8. Edwin R says:

    Thanks for sharing such an informative article about the importance of Images on website , with us all. According to me the Importance of images in generating a lead has been well known in traditional marketing but Relevant product Image on eCommerce websites or online shopping store becomes even more important when there’s no physical product for users to see properly. The Photos on eCommerce website alone have to work to convey the true look and feel of your product.

  9. Colby Snow says:

    Great post thank you!

    I think I will revise some aspects of my website thanks to you.
    However I can’t find any 360 degrees photography through the website you highlighted… Do you have an example relating to this solution?

    Many thanks!

  10. I learned a lot reading this article.

    Obviously our eyes are involved in hundred millions of ads every day and only a few will draw our attention. That’s why we need to choose the perfect picture.
    But I think you don’t need to pay to get beautiful photos. There’s great images stock for free, isn’t it ?

    Thanks for sharing !

  11. Juan Barron says:

    It’s interesting that I’m perusing this article in the wake of going to a site prior today that had a stock photograph at the top and in their little fly up saying I could converse with somebody face to face on the off chance that I needed to. You’re correct, drawing in photographs that have something to do with the objectives of the site bodes well. What’s more, on the off chance that you can’t do that, at that point simply utilize your logo and be finished with it.

  12. Thank you for sharing superb informations. Your website is very cool. I’m impressed by the details that you have on this blog. It reveals how nicely you understand this subject. Bookmarked this web page, will come back for more articles. You, my friend, ROCK!

    I found just the information I already searched all over the place and just could not come across.
    What a perfect web site

  13. This one is a wonderful collection for bloggers, who don’t want to (or have to) spend a lot of money on stock images. I’ve used some of these sites for picking up images for my sites regularly – like Pixabay and Gratisography!

    And unlike the “stock” images, the pictures I see on this site are more friendly to the eyes and less “stocky”

    Thanks for sharing this wonderful list. I’ll add the other sites that I currently don’t use to my list image source.

  14. This was a wonderful read as usual. I was wondering why you haven’t included Canva in the list. I know they have relatively cheap images and i also find the ability to add messages and other vector elements great as well.

    Also, the ability to choose the type of post you want to create (blog, fb, twitter, etc.) comes in very handy for people who don’t have the skills to create their own images or don’t know the image dimensions required by each social media site.

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