A good content is the combination of text, images, and other graphic content. An image makes your content look visually appealing if they are relevant to the context. However, the million dollar question is that where can you find a good quality free stock images for commercial use?
90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual. The human brain processes image 60K times faster than the text.
Fortunately, a variety of excellent free stock images ( for commercial use) are available online. We’ve done the dirty work for you and compiled a list of 15 websites to download stock images. These images/photographs are FREE under Creative Commons or Public Domain directions that allow you to copy and modify for commercial purpose without any additional permission. However, be sure to read license agreement of each site carefully, as terms may change over time.
15. Unsplash
Unsplash has over 300,000 beautiful high-resolution stock photos for everyone with thousands more added every day.
All the images are royalty free for commercial use which provides users with the freedom to copy, modify, distribute, and use all of the photos without permissions or attribution.
14. Burst by Shopify
Burst is a free stock photo site that is powered by Shopify. Most of the photos are taken in-house and are themed around trending business, industries, e-commerce as well as general photography. Most of the photos are licensed under Creative Commons CC0 while others fall under Shopify’s own photo license.
13. Pickupimage
Good collection of nature and outdoor-related photos. Without registration, you can download 100% royalty free stock images for commercial use.
12. FreeImages
FreeImages.com is the source of over 350,000 free stock images. The website has User-friendly navigation, however, you may experience a slow downloading speed.
11. Life of Pix
This website has a huge collection of lifestyle and travel photos. They are sourced from Leeroy Advertising Agency located in Montreal. You can share and download photos freely.They also offer free videos, clips, and loops.
10. Death To Stock Photo
It works slightly different way, you need to submit your email for monthly packs and every month you will receive a new pack of 10 royalty-free stock images. You may also try their Premium membership that starts from $15/month to $180/year.
9. Dreamstime
Dreamstime also has a Section for free images. You should try this section as well.
8. Public Domain Pictures
It has a huge collection of a wide variety of free public domain, high-resolution stock, photos clicked by amateur photographers. Images released under CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain but some photos are only available with a premium subscription.
7. Freestocks.org
Freestocks is another website where you find free high-quality images for your website and blog. It has a huge collection of images from professional photographers as well as amateur photographers.
6. FoodiesFeed
You can find an awesome naturally looking food photos that are completely free to download under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) license. Great photo selection that will make you crave for a snack while browsing through their library of 900 HD quality photos.
5. Pexels
Pexels provides high quality and completely free stock photos, licensed under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) license.
It has a collection of over 40,000 high-quality images. All photos are tagged and easily searchable to find exactly what you’re looking for. Additionally, the website is clean and intuitive along with an advanced search functionality.
4. Pixabay
A mega collection (Over 1.4 million ) of stock photos and graphics content are available Free for commercial use. Make sure to use their search engine to specify the details while searching for your dream photo and I am sure something will come up to satisfy your needs.
You can also download HD quality video as well. All graphics content are released under Creative Commons CC0. No registration is required.
3. Freepik
Freepik is one of the leading websites of free stock photos, illustrations, vector graphics, and even a handful of videos. In fact, this is one of my favourite site for stock images.
You can find great graphic content that can be used in both personal and commercial projects.
This sites claims over 30 million monthly visitors from over 230 countries worldwide. All photos are nicely tagged, searchable and also easy to discover through their discover pages.
2. Wikipedia Commons
Although the images are not super high quality but this site has a huge database of freely usable media content. Since anyone can contribute to this site therefore double -check the license for each individual image before its use.
1. Google Advanced Image Search
Google Advanced Image Search is a method of finding free-to-use images through Google’s own search tools. Here’s a quick guide.
1. Enter a search term in Google Images search.
2. Click the Setting icon, then select Advanced Search.
3. Scroll down and go to the “Then narrow your results by” section
4. Select free to use or share, even commercially option from usage rights
5. Click the Advanced Search button.
6. The image search results will provide you with a plethora of images to choose from.
