Stock photography can be expensive. And randomly grabbing licensed images from the Internet can cost you thousands of dollars if you’re found violating a copyright and threatened with legal action (this happened to someone I talked to at a Meetup).
Free Photos, No Attribution Required
Here are some sources for license-free stock photos! No attribution required (but it is often encouraged, and please double-check, as licensing can change):
- Burst
- FreeImages
- Gratisography
- Morguefile
- reshot
- Pexels
- Picography
- picjumbo
- Pixabay
- SplitShire
- StockSnap – scroll down past the Shutterstock photos to see the free ones.
- Stockvault
- Stokpic
- Unsplash
The featured image at the top of this article is from Pixabay.
Specialty Photos
These are sources of specialty photos:
- Foodiesfeed
Professional food photos. Attribution is requested but not required.
Archival / Historical
These sites offer free historical/archival photos. Attribution may be required:
- New York Public Library Digital Collections
These photos are very old but could be useful for a retro or historical site - Wikimedia Commons
Some photos require attribution or have other requiremetns.
Attribution Required
These sites offer free images but they may require attribution or have other limitations:
- Dreamstime
Has a free section but attribution is required. - FreeFoto
Attribution and link are required. - freepik
Free photos, vector art, icons, and PSDs, but attribution is required. - NASA on The Commons
Free photos, just need to give attribution to NASA. - NASA Visible Earth
Free with attribution, unless otherwise noted. - openphoto
- pdpics
- PhotoPin
License varies with photo.
Free Videos
This site offers free videos!
Free Illustrations
Check out these great free illustrations!
So, as you can see, there are lots of sources of royalty-free photos on the Internet! Don’t take chances by randomly downloading photos!
What are some sources of free photos that I don’t have here? Please comment below. – Brian
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