Stock photos are used by websites and blogs as images and graphic representations of what an article is about. Many times, stock photographers put their photos out there on photography websites for free, which means that the photos are under the Creative Commons Public Domain or have no copyright restrictions before the public can use them. Stock photos can also come at a price where photographers sell their stock images on microstock photo websites like Shutterstock, iStockPhoto etc.
If you are looking to download free stock photos, then you need the images that don’t have any copyright licensing or are under Creative Commons. Using these images means that you are free to edit them to your liking without asking permission from the photographer or paying a fee.
It is also a cheaper option for many blogs and websites as they don’t have to buy images for every blog post published. Premium stock photos have their advantages as well like they are usually more personalised to the reader and are of higher quality. But that’s not why you’re here. Let’s share 20 of the best websites where you can grab stock photos for free.
20 Websites For Downloading Free Stock Photos
Nappy.co
Nappy is a great website for free stock photos. Nappy mainly publishes photos of black and brown people. This sets Nappy out as different from other free stock image websites. Nappy is a great photo website doing the Lord’s work for black people representation. So, if you need free stock photos of black people, Nappy is a great place to branch.
Pixabay
Pixabay is a fantastic option for getting free stock photos. Pixabay allows users to get royalty-free images, videos and graphics. Pixabay has over 1 million free stock photos for you to look forward to!
Unsplash
Unsplash is like a huge photography community where creators from all over the world can share their free stock photos on the platform. Users can like, share and download these images for both personal and commercial use.
Freepik
FreePik is a great platform to get free graphic resources, vectors, stock photos, icons and more. As a creator, FreePik is a great place to get graphics for your creative project.
Pexels
Pexels is available even in-app format for Android devices. They have up to 3 million free stock photos and videos for your use.
Stock Free Images
StockFreeImages is a good option for you to download free stock photos from. There are over 3.4 million free stock photos available on their website!
Free Images
FreeImages has different photo categories for users to browse through to find what they want quicker. FreeImages has over 300,000 free stock images on their website.
Free Range Stock
FreeRangeStock is a website where you can download free stock photos in high resolution for free. To start downloading photos from there, you need to have an account.
Free Photos Bank
FreePhotosBank is a great website for free stock photos. All their photos are under the Creative Commons License and are free to download by users.
PicJumbo
PicJumbo is a free stock photo website that was created by designer and photographer Victor Hanacek. PicJumbo is a great place to source free stock photos for your creative project or blogs.
Pixabay
Pixabay is an online place where creatives can download free stock photos shared by photographers. Pixabay has all its images licensed under the Pixabay License.
The Chive
TheChive is a platform for sharing weird and funny photos. TheChive has photos of different random things like women, funny images and more. The images are free to download.
Worth 1000
Worth1000 is now a part of designcrowd.com and the website was originally a place for photography contests. It was opened in 2002 and the images shared by competitors were completely free. You can still find the images on Design Crowd.
Imgur
Imgur is an image hosting website where popular images from the internet are hosted. Images from Reddit are especially posted on Imgur. And the images are free to use.
Canva
Canva is popularly a design and photo editing platform. But there is also the photo collection aspect of Canva where users can browse through over 1 million images hosted on the Canva website.
Gratisography
On Gratisography, images are split into different categories which include nature photos, background photographs and more. Gratisography is a website where a quirky collection of images can be downloaded for free.
Snapographic
Snapographic is a website where photographers share free and license-free stock photos to the public. You can get free stock photos from Snapographic.
Life of Pix
Lifeofpix is unique in the sense that users can search for free stock images on the website based on colours or the format of pictures.
Foter
Foter is a website where images related to interior designing are shared. All interior decor related images shared are free stock images that are free to use.
Creative Commons
Creative Commons images are free to download and use. The website has been in existence since 2001 and its popularity continues to grow. Anything from literary works, research works, music, images etc., are all shared on the website.
You can also add https://freemicrostock.com – altough the database is small, it keeps growing with high quality images