15 New Websites to Download Free Stock Photos
It’s not an exaggeration to say that you can’t be called a designer if you haven’t used stock photos. Even though some designers hate stock photos, the hugemajority uses stock photos and is satisfied with this situation. The main problem with using stock photos is that these have a negativeimpacton the originality of a website. A stock photo is likely to be used by multiple designers and the consequences may be extremely negative. Imagine how a client would react after seeing a photo on your website that can be seen on ten other websites…?
Having your own collections of images is a solution but it’s difficult to save and manage thousands of images on your hard drive. Also, that would be a very time consuming activity! Luckily, there is another solution: many designers aren’t aware about it, therefore you may profit!
A huge mistake many designers make when searching for stock photos is thatthey search on the most famous websites. Yes, you do have a certain amount of certitude that you will find the proper images, but there’s a very high chance that the respective images have been already downloaded by others as well. This situation could be avoided by using stock photos showcased by websites that lack notoriety. There are websites that are new and less visibleto designers that offer top-quality stock photos. The next 15 new websites that I’m going to present fall into this category. I made some extensive research and I found amazing websites that offer stock photos for free! Everything manmade is perfectible (including my post), therefore just incase I missed your favorite source of downloadingfree stock images please add alinkto the website in the comment form! Also, please don’t be selfish and share the post with your friends!
1. Pexels
I totally agree that it may be difficult understanding the concept of creative common licenses and this is one of the reasons why I fell in love with “Pexelsâ€. The images from here may be copied, modified or used without asking for permissions. Pexels’ database consists of more than 3000 photos and at least 70 new ones are addedweekly.
2. Freeuse.io
I believe that the name of this website pretty much suggestsits aim. Free Use is another free stock images website that must be added in the bookmark list of any respectable designer. The images are top-quality and surely will enhance your projects.
3. Unsplash
Unsplash.com is a minimalist website where impressive images are uploaded so may be used in personal and commercial projects. If you used an image from Unsplash.comfor a beautiful design piece then you may submit itso it may be added in the “Made with Unsplash†gallery.
4. Pixabay
I think that Pixabay is the largest stock photo website from this list – it has more than 430,000 images, vectors and art illustrations. Another huge advantage of this website is the search system…it is very efficient and useful.
5. Gratisography
Yes, the preloading plugin used isn’t a good criterion to determine the best websites to download free stock photos from, but you can’t ignore the preloading images of Gratisography. Of course, the images offered are all taken by professional photographers.
6. Picography
Picography is a collection of hi-resolution free stock photos that are very expressive and 100% will attract the viewer’s attention when used in projects.
7. Little Visuals
Little Visuals is the sad story of a young man that passed awayway too soon. No new pictures have been uploaded since more than a year now, but the ones available are attractive and have tons of interesting details.
8. KaboomPics
KaboomPics is a resource of free stock images that must be visitedperiodically. The main advantages are the search options (use the search bar, the categories or the tags) and the huge number of images. Also, the quality of the images is another bonus of this website.
9. Splitshire
Splitshire is a website that will be much visited by designers if its owner will keep on uploading photos of the same quality. All photos currently available are very expressive and I must admit that I spend tens of minutes only admiring them.
10. Life of Pix
Life of Pix is a new project and I think that you should give a heed. It has a “brother†website, Life of Vids, where many stock videos can be found. Both websites have interesting free items.
11. Stock Snap
Stock Snap is a great source of stock photos; amazing photos are periodically added here, photos that may be used anywhere, regardless if it’s for commercial purposes. Another bonus is the useful sorting system.
12. Lock and Stock Photos
Lock and Stock Photos is a blog and a very expressive image is added here on a daily basis. All images available are very interesting, having tons of details that are emphasized by the minimalist design of the website.
13. Epicva
Epicva fully deserves its place inthe list of honor: the images available here are free to use regardless of the project type, the design of the website is user-friendly and of course, the images are attention grabbing and taken only from interesting perspectives.
14. Negative Space
Negative Space is an insignificant resource if we’re judging by the number of the images being showcased, but a great one from the quality perspective. I definitely enjoy the filtering options (including the possibility of the selecting the images by color).
15. Designer Pics
Finally, we got to the last website from this list. In spite of its position, it doesn’t mean that it should be the last in your preferences because the images are interesting and free to use even for commercial purposes.
I hope that you will appreciate my endeavors of searching for the best websites to download free stock photos. Also, I will be extremely glad to know that you will use some of these websites. It will be great if you could share your opinionswith us on the use of free stock photos in your design works so please use the comment form to get in touch with us.
About the Author
This article is written by Daniel, the owner of Daniel2Design.com. Visit his blog in order to stay updated to the latest news&trends in the web design world.
